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Copight N°_'5.2^. 


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A WESTERN COW BOY 





A LITTLE JOURNEY 


THROUGH 

The Great Southwest 

For Home and School, and 
Upper Grades 


by 

FELIX J. KOCH, A. B. 

(MEMBER AMERICAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY) 


Author of “A Little Journey to the Balkans,” “Little 
Journey to Austro-Hungary,” etc. 



1924 

Ao FLANAGAN COMPANY 
CHICAGO 




I 


COPYRIGHT, 1907 1924, BY A. FLANAGAN COMPANY 

Fjsfc 
* KyG> 





4) 



/ , 

0 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

JAN 14 '24 

©C1A7G5691 

qAO | 




A Little Journey Through the 
Southwest 


FROM NEW ORLEANS TO LOS ANGELES 

N OW that so many American boys and girls are 
yearning to make a trip across the length or 
breadth of their own country, due to a growing senti¬ 
ment among those who travel, which has for its motto, 
“See America First,” the number of young people who 
would like first of all to see the great Southwest prob¬ 
ably equals that of those who would go first t ! o 
New England, following our other Little Journe^. 

Down in the Southwest, the Indian still lives, in 
places, in his primitive state. There, too, is the wily 
Mexican, or Spaniard, as he is called, and there, too, we 
shall find the Chinaman and the Jap, though these are 
more numerous in the extreme West. Then, too, all 
the wild life of the plains is to be seen on this Little 
Journey, and the very path of the railway is ever 
through scenes that teem with historical legend. 

Everything west of the Mississippi and south of a 
line drawn, say, east and west through San Francisco, 
may be termed the Southwest. 

QUAINT CORNERS OF NEW ORLEANS 

In order that we may have some idea of the magni¬ 
tude of the distances in the Southwest and West, and 



4 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


also that we may appreciate the variety of life and of 
culture in the region, we will do well to begin our Little 
Journey at New Orleans. And we should start on our 
trip as soon after the New Year as possible, thus 
receiving the benefit of the mild climate of that season. 

New Orleans is perhaps more familiar by name to us 



CREOLE QUARTER, NEW ORLEANS 


than is any southern city. Being at the mouth of the 
Mississippi, according to the popular geographies, we 
have been accustomed to refer to it when tracing that 
stream on our maps. Then, too, with cotton and cane, 
the Louisiana Purchase, and a dozen similar, oft-men¬ 
tioned matters, old Orleans (“Or-luns,” they say dewn 
there) has been brought to mind. 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


5 


New Orleans is quite a city of conventions, and when 
the great cotton congresses of January meet, we had 
best prepare in advance and reserve our rooms. If 
not, we may have an opportunity to try some lodgings 
that are queer for an American city. Coming into the 
“ Crescent City” at half-past ten, we will find all the 
large hotels crowded. Cabbies will drive us about from 
place to place, until finally, in disgust, we let the driver 
take us where he will. This means, perhaps, to some 
ratty lodging-house, with mere thin partitions for 
walls, the furniture consisting, probably, of only a cheap 
iron bed and a basin. This will be just the first of the 
many queer places in which we are to lodge on our 
Little Journey. 

When morning comes we are only too ready to leave 
the place. So miserable was it, that we are surprised 
to find it is just round the corner from Canal St., 
one of the famous streets of the world. Canal St., in 
New Orleans, and Market St., in San Francisco, are 
among the famous thoroughfares we will have to visit. 

Already we seem to feel we are in a different part of 
the country. 

CREOLE LAND AND THE FRENCH QUARTER 

Narrow little streets, their asphalt rotted by the per¬ 
petual damp which is the great menace of New Orleans, 
open off to right and left. Houses, all of which are old, 
fringe these, and add to the air of antiquity by pro¬ 
jecting balconies which adorn every one of them, 
often extending into iron galleries, such as we found in 
Bulgaria. Many of these balconies have very orna- 


6 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


mental iron railings and on almost all of them there 
will be potted plants. Most of these balconies are held 
in position by iron bars placed along the curb, so that 
the sidewalks remain in perpetual shadow from the 
overhanging porch. 

We are here often reminded of old Paris,f for this is 
the famous French section of the city—tenanted even 
now by descendants of the old French and Spanish 
settlers. These people are usually very dark-skinned, 
so much so as to be mistaken frequently for colored 
people, and are known as Creoles (Kray-oll-s). They 
keep to themselves and, as we shall find, have little to 
do with strangers outside of purely business matters. 

In the dilapidated buildings of the French quarter, 
there are elegant modern stores. Flower-sellers fre¬ 
quently have places outside these, for the Latin 
peoples are very fond of flowers. Then, too, as we are 
in the proper season for the trip, i. e., early in January, 
we shall see many windows offering wares for the 
Mardi Gras, the great annual fete and masque of this 
city. 

Walking down Royal St., in the heart of the French 
quarter, we see everywhere scenes typical of Creole life 
and of the South. Negresses, in dirty white bandanas, 
folded as only a plantation darkey knows how to fold, 
stand about on the corners. Oysters are piled every¬ 
where in tall, tapering baskets, for no city in the world, 
not even Baltimore, is as fond of oysters as is New 
Orleans. We pass French ladies with their bonnets 
tied under the chin by heavy velvet bands in the old 
French fashion, or we may see a gentleman with a 

t‘‘A Little Journey to France.” 



THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


7 


mustache and imperial in the style of Napoleon III. 
Cafes, with restaurant and billiard apartments are here, 
and one enters them by way of a sort of lobby, in which 
bootblacks are invariably stationed Inside, the men 
sit long over their coffee, reading the newspapers, as 
they do in the cafes of Europe. 

If we continue our ramble, we may chance on a pair 
of negro nuns, sisters of a local order, out upon an 
errand. Chestnut venders, too, will stop us, and ask 
us to buy from their polished urns* Fruit-stands 
are numerous, close up against the house walls, expos¬ 
ing strawberries, dates, oranges, apples, and pears, as 
well as grapes, pineapples, and bananas, on this balmy 
January day. 

On street-doors we note everywhere a card on which 
the words “open” or “shut” are printed. This is 
done because the office is frequently so far in the rear 
of the building, that one could not tell whether busi¬ 
ness were in progress or not. 

By and by we are among the antique shops for which 
New Orleans is famous. Shortly after the Civil War, 
when so many of the great Southern families found 
themselves impoverished, collectors went from plan¬ 
tation to plantation, buying up the heavy, antique 
furniture; the art treasures, many of which had come 
from France, and the like These command a good 
price Not all of them, however, found sale, and so 
have gone from curio-dealer to curio-dealer, and then 
on to the antique shops which are veritable museums, 
especially of samples of artistic workmanship from 
France. 

To enumerate everything we see of interest in these 


8 


A LITTLE JOURNEA THROUGH 


shops would be impossible. Just a few of the most 
unique can be jotted down. A medallion in the 
form of a peacock, of solid gold; a genuine Rose du 
Barry vase, against the imitation of which Louis XV. 
issued a royal decree; queer watches, running twenty 
days at a winding; swords and muskets, and other 
family heirlooms are here. Especially noteworthy, 
however, is a watch given by Napoleon to Marshal Ney, 
and by him in turn willed to his son, Joseph, who 
brought it to Neyr Orleans. This timepiece plays a 
French march every hour, and furthermore, on 
pressing a spring, the owner can have it strike the time 
in the dark. 

From the curio stores we will ramble down a quiet 
French lane of cobble-stones to the Chartres St. dis¬ 
trict, which is interesting for its innumerable bird and 
animal stores. Down on the great Southern planta¬ 
tions the ladies are exceptionally fond of pet birds, prin¬ 
cipally parrots, canaries or mocking-birds, and like¬ 
wise of pet dogs. So there is square on square of New 
Orleans given over to their sale. 

One of the attendants tells us some interesting things 
in regard to these. Parrots, for example, he says, are 
no longer caught in the Tropics for sale, but are hatched 
in captivity, as they then become better talkers. The 
wild birds, the parents of these, are usually satisfied 
with cage-life, only they will not talk. Hence, for the 
genuine Mexican bird, the prices are lower than for our 
American, home-bred species. In the New Orleans 
stores they do not try to teach the birds to speak, as 
this is next to impossible where there are so many 
about but leave it to the buyer. They are, however, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


9 


always certain as to the speech-capacity in a given 
bird, there being certain signs, understood only by the 
expert, to give this secret away. 

About canaries, too, we learn interesting facts. 
These birds are brought here from Germany, and come 
in great willow cages, a thousand birds to the lot. 
Think of the bottled-up concerts that such a piece of 
freight contains! 

As we go on through the heart of New Orleans, we 
will see other fads and fancies of the South. There 
will be hawkers of baby alligators, which are taken 
from the swamps in nets, being usually found in litters 
of as many as twenty-five. These are sold as pets at 
fifty cents apiece. In the summer their owners feed 
them raw meat, once a week; in the winter season they 
sleep, and need no nourishment. 

Then, too, we will perhaps purchase some of the little 
waxen Mexican figures of New Orleans characters that 
are to be found in every Southern home. Nor are 
these cheap—not even a small specimen of a darkey 
cotton-picker is obtainable for less than a dollar. 

THE SPIRIT OF THE SOUTH 

We like to linger in New Orleans because we get here 
the spirit of the life of all that part of our great South¬ 
west and South lying east of the Pecos River. It is 
so different from what we shall find beyond that it 
repays us to study it carefully. 

Down among the French signs and the Creole shop¬ 
keepers, there is the old Hotel St. Louis, a four-story, 
dilapidated structure, the hiding-place of bats and 
thieves. When this place was built, in 1841, it was 


10 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


famous the world over, having cost over a. million 
dollars. Here the mystic carnival balls were held, and 
here, too, in a gloomy corner, the stranger is still shown 
the block upon which slaves were sold—as Mrs. Stowe 
describes in “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” 

Almost across the way from here is a house built for 
the express purpose of becoming the American home 
of Napoleon. In 1821, we recall, a plot was formed by 
the French of this city to rescue the Emperor from St. 
Helena, and a fast schooner, the Seraphine (Say-rah- 
feen) was manned and set out. On reaching the mouth 
of the Mississippi, however, this steamer turned back, 
for an incoming ship brought the news of the Em¬ 
peror’s death. Aside from the queer watch-tower and 
the arched arcades about the interior court, it is a 
commonplace building, housing to-day a grocery and 
saloon. 

It is but a short step now out of the French into the 
Spanish section of New Orleans, and the Cabildo (Ka- 
bill-dough) or main square. This is a great flat park 
of palms containing the statue of General Jackson on 
horseback, pictures of which one sees in all the school¬ 
books. On this plaza faces the deeply-colonnaded 
Cabildo building, where the formal transfer of the 
province of Louisiana from France to the United States 
occurred on December 20, 1803. In it the French and 
the Spanish governors had their seats and in the rear 
one still sees the site of the calaboose or prison into 
which heretics were thrust by order of the Spanish 
Inquisition. It is now a police station, and one of the 
cells contains a pair of stocks hewn from a solid cypress 
log, and fitted with holes for the ankles of the offender. 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


11 


Next to the Cabildo is the Cathedral, its exterior 
coated with the familiar yellow concrete of the south. 
This is not durable, and hence has to be replaced 
frequently. Then on the right and left are long, three- 
story red brick buildings, a block in length, each one 
having its balconies. These, too, are interesting for 
their age, having been erected by the Baroness Pon- 
talba (Pon-tahl-bah), daughter of the Don Andrea 
Almonastrey Roxas, a well-to-do Spanish noble, and 
colonel of the provincial troops. It was the Don who 
built the cathedral, and gave it to the colony, and for 
whom, each evening, at vespers, the bells are tolled, 
and masses are said for his soul. 

There is no end to the interesting things in this section. 
Here is the French market, famous for the neatness 
with which every article of food is set before the buyer. 
Even the meat, for instance, is kept full of long iron 
skewers, which extend perhaps an inch below, so that 
it may rest on these, rather than on the clean marble 
stands. Pineapples are hung each from a cord, and 
soup vegetables are tied into ornamental bouquets as if 
for a vase, instead of the kitchen. Then, too, there are 
coffee stalls on the market, as in Paris, with great brass 
urns, and presided over by men in long blue sack-coats 
or blouses, such as we met with on our Little Journey 
to France. 

Of course, we must linger at the river, the wide 
Mississippi, a muddy, turbid stream as we see it here, 
with the banks covered over with board-walk, on which 
stand bales of cotton without number. That, too, is a 
study for us, and if we have time we can saunter inland 
from the levee to the Cotton Exchange, where the 


12 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


brokers gather around a little fountain and raise or 
lower the price. Down here by the river, however, the 
lazy picturesque negroes driving the teams from their 



ROLLING COTTON, NEW ORLEANS 


seats on the topmost bale, or bearing the cotton off the 
stern-wheelers, or, if they have a coin in hand, lounging 
on the levee in the sunshine, idle and happy, and care¬ 
less of prices or time, will interest us. In fact, if we are 
careful travelers, we shall return some other time and 
spend an afternoon simply taking in this life along the 
levee. We will go on to where the molasses (’lasses 
they say here) and the cane-sugar barrels are grouped 
by the thousands, while a great refinery belches out 
its smoke on the scene. 







THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


13 


Then we will sit upon a barrel and gaze on that 
mighty river, far across which lies Algiers (Ahl-geers), 
a suburb of the Crescent City. Crescent City, indeed, 
as we see the river bending down and around on its 
way to the still distant Delta. 

It takes us back to the school-room, and in fancy we 
repeat to ourselves, “The Mississippi River rises in a 
little lake north of Lake Itasca (I-tas-ka).” 

Then, before we get much farther, we are reminded 
of the story of the child who asked why, if the Missis¬ 
sippi was the “Father of Waters,” it was not called the 
Mister-sippi River. 

But much as we should like to stay, there is not more 
time for day dreaming. We will pass the lugger, or 
small boat landing, where oysters are being brought in, 
in the tall tapering baskets, and then have our walk 
include the French Opera House, in order to see by day 
the famous old building where the Mardi Gras balls are 
held; and then proceed to old Congo Square, where, in 
the days before the war, the negro slaves danced 
“voo-doo” (vu-duh), under Bras Coupe (Brahs Coop-a), 
the black king and the captain of the swamp-hidden 
runaways. 

We are back in fancy in “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” or 
with “Daddy Jake, the Runaway” or any of the 
other delightful Stowe or Chandler Harris stories, as we 
stand on this square. 

Voo-doo! that, in itself, is full or interest;its legends 
are numerous, even now the darkies all around will tell 
them—how if you dance so many rounds this way, you 
will be immune from the yellow fever, of which New 
Orleans is always in dread; or, if you dance and then 


14 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


tap this or that, you cannot get the cholera. Voo-doo, 
in short, is a sort of supernatural way of guarding 
against the familiar diseases of the South, by doing 
queer penances or by contortions of the body. 

And the old swamp kings—anyone here can tell you 
of them. When a slave ran away from his master, 
rather than be sold “down river,” to New Orleans, he 
would make for the swamps we will see later in the 
week. There he wandered until he met some other 
runaway, when the two joined forces and went on till 



A TYPICAL BAYOU 


they met a third. So bands were formed, often for 
protection, some to keep watch against pursuit, while 
certain members slept, some to do the foraging, and 






THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


15 


the like. Each swamp-band had its leader, known as 
the king, and the experiences of some of these read like 
the wildest fiction. 

An electric car comes along, and we step aboard. In 
the north we would perhaps take the last seat, if this 
were vacant, that we might get out more easily on 
reaching our destination. Here, however, attached to 
the backs of these last few seats on either side of the 
aisle, we see a small, oblong wire screen, upon which 
are the words: “For Colored Patrons Only.” 

This, more than anything we have yet seen, makes us 
realize that we are still in the South. Although the 
war is at an end, and although the Constitution has 
declared otherwise, we note everywhere that the black 
man is not treated on terms of equality with the white. 
He is not even spoken of as colored, but the term 
“niggah” is used at all times, even in his presence. So 
here in the cars—the law prescribing that the colored 
people be granted equal rights with the whites is 
evaded by saying that if a white man sat in these 
colored folks’ seats he would be ushered out, 
hence no colored man can sit in the seats for the 
whites. 

Barber shops down here, we notice from the cars, not 
being satisfied with the usual pole, have the entire 
front painted in red and white striping. 

As it is lunch-time, we will return to a famous little 
restaurant in the French quarter which has been one 
of the institutions of New Orleans almost since the war, 
because of its excellent cooking. Here they call the 
meal breakfast, though we sit down to it at half-past 
eleven. The courses are served in regular order, nor 


16 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


will they hurry, and no person can finish his meal before 
the rest. 

There is a bottle of wine for each place, French 
fashion, and a thick—very thick—slice of bread. 
Then the meal itself begins. First there are crawfish, 
which some of us may have to be shown how to eat— 
simply by breaking them open and sucking out the 
tail. Then omelet, with parsley, steaming hot, and full 
of a queer black spice, imported from Paris. Celery 
and radishes are passed about, and after them there is 
brought in a curious dish which we all fail to recognize. 
Some guess it is tripe, others snails—as a matter of fact, 
the latter are right. Meantime the old Frenchman 
and his wife have started conversation. They like the 
cooking to be praised and we humor them in this 
respect. Before long, fried chicken and boiled potatoes 
are before us. After that half a tomato, with parsley 
on top, also steaming hot, and a piece of beef-steak, 
hidden beneath cress. We are wondering what the 
wind-up will consist of. It is Roquefort or Swiss 
cheese, and apples. Then black coffee, into which 
brandy is poured, and then lit, so that we can drink* it 
well-nigh burning. 

It is now time to take to the carriage which a friend 
in the city has prepared for us. From the garden, a 
bouquet of roses and violets has been brought; this 
although we are still in early January and at home it is 
very cold. 

We will drive along the famous St. Charles Ave. to 
the outskirts, so as to see the handsome southern 
homes, far back in their gardens, and often well-nigh 
hidden from view by tall palms and oak trees. Be- 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


17 


tween the walks and the street there are rows of palms, 
which remind us of Ragusa in Dalmatia. 

Here and there among these places, there will be a 
fashionable cafe, as in Europe, where ladies may drop 
in of an afternoon, for a cup of Mocha and cakes. 



A NEW ORLEANS CEMETERY 


Most of these cafes sell novelties, too, and among 
them such things as dressed fleas—tiny specimens of 
these insects, which are perfectly attired as man and 
wife. 

By and by we are out among the cemeteries of New 
Orleans, as curious as any in the world. As we shall 
find at San Francisco, all of these cemeteries are 




18 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


grouped about a central area, but unlike those of the 
Doomed City, the dead here repose in vaults. Usually 
a vault is built to contain four bodies, and their names 
will be set on the slab on the front. When, then, the 
fifth person in a family dies, the vault is opened and 
the remains of some one of the other four gathered 
together into a new smaller coffin, or simply into a pine 
box and placed in the receptacle, as it is called. This 
receptacle is simply an ordinary cemented cellar at the 
base of the vault, in which the remains gradually 
moulder away. Sometimes, instead, the remains of, 
say the fourth person, will be put in a smaller casket, 
and room found for this in the vault itself. The cere¬ 
mony reminds us somewhat of Pere la Chaise, in Paris, 
visited on our other Little Journey. 

Some of the vaults here are very beautiful, the long 
shelves extending along their fronts being adorned 
with vases and urns filled with flowers. A vault we 
shall be particularly interested in is one built into a 
grass-covered mound, and topped by a great column, 
for there, among others, lies entombed Jefferson Davis, 
the President of the Confederacy. A simple slab of 
slate, cut with his name and dates of birth and death, 
distinguishes this entombment from the rest in the 
catacomb. 

We have now seen what is quaint and curious of New 
Orleans. It will not do, however, to neglect the life of 
the city to-day. Consequently, we shall continue our 
way “up-town,” as the residential section is termed, 
toward Rosa Park and the other suburban districts. 
We note here that the pronunciation is typically 
southern—“park” becomes “p-aa-h-k.” The park, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


19 


like so many in the city, consists of an oval of palms 
and shrubbery which is kept in order by the residents 
on either side. Out here one finds still in vogue the 
colonial style of Southern home, and if the evening be 
a bit chilly, there are logs in the great fire-places, before 
which the children gather with their darkey “ mam¬ 
mies” (or nurses), to pop corn and listen to the folk¬ 
lore of the cotton field and the cane brake. 

Some of these little ones’ rooms in the homes are 
exceedingly pretty, one in particular into which we 
may peep, having the walls covered with a paper 
reproducing Delft designs and colorings and being 
filled with nick-nacks of all sorts, in Dutch style, 
with a border of dollies on a shelf, each doll dressed 
in correct Dutch costume. 

In the evening we attend the French opera (if we 
understand the language) and enjoy one of the finest 
performances of opera it has ever been our good fortune 
to witness. We note quite a number of European 
customs here, among others the three knocks by the 
stage-manager behind the scenes when the curtain is 
to rise, and the stamping of feet by the most refined in 
the audience, if the intermissions are prolonged too 
greatly. 

After the theater everyone goes to the restaurants 
for a queer combination—beer and oysters on the 
shell, or else fried oysters. There is no end to the con¬ 
sumption of these bivalves in old Orleans. 

FAREWELL TO NEW ORLEANS 

Before quitting New Orleans next morning, we must 
take a peep at the lobby of the St. Charles Hotel, one of 


20 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


the famous hostelnes of the South, if only to study the 
“life” that gathers here. 

Then, threading our way toward the station, we step 
into the post-office to mail a letter. We find that the 
drops for mail are arranged by states, and thus we do 
the sorting ourselves and save the clerks their greatest 
trouble. Outside a milk-cart rattles by, a queer two¬ 
wheeled cart shaped like a buggy, with tin cans so 
bright as to look like silver. We snapshot this and 
then proceed. 

We are now bound on a very long journey, to El 
Paso in fact, but the nature of the territory to be tra¬ 
versed is such that we can see it as well from the train 
as we could by getting off at intervals. 

We must, however, avail ourselves of the benefits of 
the observation car, and to do this we secure berths for 
our sleeper at once. At the very beginning of the 
journey we are made to realize that distances down in 
the Southwest are tremendous, for the fare on this, 
our first jump, from New Orleans to El f*aso, is about 
thirty-three dollars, with seven dollars additional for 
the sleeper. Our study of the map would hardly pre¬ 
pare us for this. 

We are lucky in happening to meet some acquaint¬ 
ances, bound for Los Angeles, and the winter resorts of 
the coast, and while the train draws out through the 
famous swamps, now filled with fluffy grasses, and the 
grain flats, with their curious cribs, we renew past 
friendships and hear news of mutual acquaintances. 

Already we are among the sluggish bayous (buy- 
yews) of Louisiana, of which we have heard so much. 
Deep, dark creeks wind quietly through these swamps, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


21 


and there are flag or reed-covered savannas, with 
lichened timber marking water courses on which 
the canoe alone can pass. This is the famous sugar 
region of Louisiana, the Teche (Tesh), as it is called. 



CROSSING THE MISSISSIPPI 

In addition to the sugar-cane, the low-lands afford 
much valuable timber. It is a paradise for the canoeist. 
In times of high water, moreover, much of this region 
is covered by the river, and snakes and alligators rest 
on the trees as in familiar pictures of Old Earth after 
the Deluge. 






22 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


Before reaching the heart of the Teche country, 
howeyer, we are to cross the Mississippi. 

CROSSING THE LARGEST RIVER IN THE WORLD 

We wonder how we are going to do it. Before we 
know it, the train has run onto a boat fitted with three 
tracks, on each of which some of the cars of our train 
are switched. Then we are ferried across. Possibly 
some of us will be glad of the chance to climb up into 
the cab of our engine, one of the famous Great Mogul 
type, and pretend we are the engineer, directing the 
expedition westward. Above us is the bridge, with 
the ferry operators, all about only the muddy water, 
and beyond, again, the great crescent that marks the 
city. We feel a slight shaking under foot as we walk 
around the boat, otherwise we might not know we were 
moving. In fact, when we take our seats in the dining- 
car, before the other bank is reached, we shall be 
wholly unconscious of all motion. 

A CONTRAST TO THE OLDEN DAYS 

After luncheon we return to the observation car, pre¬ 
pared to see the country. We cannot but recall the 
difference between this mode of going west, and that 
in which our forefathers traveled, going either by boat, 
on the long, weary trip around the Horn, or by vessel 
to Panama, and then with mules over the Isthmus and 
again by sail to the North. Still greater, even, is the 
contrast with those who “trekked” it across the plains 
or desert in the great prairie schooners of which we shall 
soon hear so much. 

Here the car has a single, long aisle down one side. 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


23 


Off from this is a compartment with tables and chairs, 
reserved for gentlemen desiring to smoke, and another 
compartment entirely of glass, in which there are cosy 
reclining chairs, writing desk and a mail-box that is 
emptied regularly. At the end of all is the broad 
platform, with camp-stools, on which we take our 
place, this to the irritation of a young bridal couple— 
like so many others, on a bridal-tour to the west—who 
had hoped to be alone. 

We are by this time again in the heart of the bayous, 
and everywhere rise levees (lay-vees), or embankments 
built on the edge of streams, much as they do in Hol¬ 
land. Contrary to our ideas of the green and sunny 
South, the dense, heavily lichened trees are now bare 
of foliage, sugar-cane plantations, with the stalks all 
down, but the yellow leaves, like those of sugar-corn, 
lying in the furrows, ready to be raked together; dense 
cypress glades, and rushes, seem to make up this land. 

By and by we stop at Bowie (Boo-e), a village of 
one-room, whitewashed frame huts, all set, as is the 
fashion here, along one main street; and on that street 
the mules and the negroes are about equally numerous. 
Some of our friends step off the car to get pieces of the 
sugar-cane lying about in profusion. This is quickly 
peeled with the pen-knife, and then broken up to dis¬ 
tribute among the crowd. 

IN THE LAND OF THE SUGAR-CANE 

They tell us to eat it — “ it is good!” We try to bite 
the cane across, but it is so tough that this is impossible. 
Then we bite in laterally, and it yields. We find the 


24 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


cane quite sweet to chew—very like sweet gum. 
What remains in the mouth after the saccharine is 
extracted, we toss away to replace with a fresh supply. 

Like ourselves, many of the tourists on board have 
never eaten cane before, so the Southerners dilate on 
its virtues. Nothing, they say, equals this red-coated, 
white-bodied rod of cane for making the eater fat and 
healthy. That is why the negroes we see cutting the 
stalks into dark-red poles, that litter the otherwise 
barren ground, are one and all healthy. 

As the bayous grow denser, we find more and more, 
that our school geography has misinformed us about 
the “winter” of the South. While the temperature 
is mild and warm, the trees and shrubs are just as 
barren and “dead” here as they are at home in winter; 
flowers and foliage are nowhere visible. The shrubs 
that border the railway and the dense, thin-trunked 
trees behind them, are without vestige of leaf. The 
long, dangling tree-moss is their only clothing. 

IN THE ACADIAN LAND 

Someone in the car has brought out a copy of 
Longfellow and begins reading “Evangeline.” Cer¬ 
tainly this is appropriate, for we, too, are now “In 
the Acadian-land, not far from the Basin of Minas” 
(My-nass). 

These swamps, a guide book tells us, were in fact 
the haunts of Felix Roux (Roo), the great Acadian 
hunter. While we were at luncheon, too, we are told 
we passed through the Bayou des Allemands (Ahl- 
maung), a little town of whitewashed houses too 
tiny to be noticed en passant—to which John Law, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


25 


of “Mississippi Bubble” fame, sent the Chevalier 
d’Arenmy, aid-de-camp of King Charles of Sweden, 
with two hundred and thirty families of colonists. 
When Law failed and fled from Paris to Venice, the 
emigrants became discouraged and prepared to return 
home. Bienville, however, induced them finally to 
stay, and gave to each a tract of land in this region 
which was known as the Cote (Kote) or Shore des 
Allemands (days Ahl' maung). Even now de¬ 
scendants of the Chevalier reside there. 

One thing we already realize, and that is, that 
this trip will make us revive forgotten history, and 
wish, just a little, that we had studied a bit harder 
at school. 

We hear again and again, for example, the terms 
“New Families” and “Old Families,” especially as ap¬ 
plied to the fertile sugar plantations here among the 
marshes, where the land is subject to tidal overflows, 
and where the bayous and arms of the sea form natural 
boundaries. These plantations are now owned by the 
“New” families, who are in many cases descendants 
of the “carpet-baggers,” who came into the South 
just after the Civil War, when her people were pros¬ 
trated by their defeat and their consequent financial 
losses. By dint of hard labor these “New Families” 
have won for themselves great fortunes. The “Old 
Families” were the great land-holders of the days before 
the war. 

Fellow travelers, of varied inclinations, find varied 
interest in the ride. Some speak of the fine fishing— 
for all the gulf fish are here—others of the game— 
bear and deer, ducks and geese; others of the cattle. 


26 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


A Kansas man aboard bought a million acres, he tells k 
for a winter cattle range. Another man draws our 
attention to the fact that the oyster and terrapin 
industry flourishes here, because of the riehness of 
the soil, which is made up of the decomposed shells 
of marine animals and of salt overflows of the Gulf, 
all of which are washed back into the bayous. 

Where the moss hangs longest and deepest from 
the trees the ground is covered with low, beautiful fan 
palms, which stand out a mass of bright green, brilliant 
in contrast to the other duller herbage, and to the 
water, which reflects them on a back-ground of bar¬ 
ren, naked trees. Now and then, where there may be 
a curve in the track, we will see a terrapin on a log. 

Then all is monotonous. 

IN THE BAYOU COUNTRY 

This part of the Southwest strikes us as remark¬ 
able for the sparsity of its population.. Now and then 
a village, such as Gibson, appears, of frame houses 
with a sawmill built on an Indian mound; otherwise 
the clearings in the bayous are untenanted. 

It is so mild and spring-like in the open air that 
we enjoy the ride immensely. Passing over a prairie 
that stretches into the distant pine forests, at the 
western edge of Louisiana, the su|ar cane begins £o 
be replaced by cotton plantations. Everywhere on 
these we see the cotton stalks—the branches at this 
season bare and black, but bearing here and there an 
occasional white, unpicked boll. Rice fields, too, 
appear, but we are surprised to find side by side with 
these semi-tropical plants, oats, beans and potatoes, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


27 


which are raised in large quantities. Thousands of 
settlers from the north, we are told, come down here, 
and by hard work get splendid crops from the swamp¬ 
land,where it seems to us as if only these great, green 
palms, and a red-berried shrub, and the moss that 
hangs here from every tree-stump, can find root in 
the stagnant water. Looking carefully, we will see 
a very crude hut here and there in the bayou, a mere 
frame of logs with a roof extending out from one side. 
It reminds us again of the huts of runaway slaves 
off in the dismal swamp. The logs lying scattered 
in the water often deceive pedestrians expecting safe 
foothold. 

The dreary light that falls on the stumps in these 
bayous becomes at last rather depressing and we are 
glad when drier rice fields follow. At Boeuf (Bohf), 
where there is a brief stoppage, we see the typical homes 
of the nearer Southwest; white frame huts, generally 
scattered and occupied, for the most part, by negroes. 
Between the houses will be meadows of the low green 
fan-palms, and in these innumerable ponies graze. 
As is this town so are many others to follow, with 
the bayou coming so close up to the settlement that 
the orioles ’ nests in the trees overhang the houses, 
and the negresses, sitting ever idle on their little 
porches, with sunbonnets at all times on their heads, 
can look out into the depths of the swamps. The 
laziness of these darkies astounds us, for not even on 
the finest days do we find them stirring or doing more 
than they absolutely must about their homes. Oc¬ 
casionally we see in these towns a larger two-story 
house—for the plantation owner—or a cemetery with 


28 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


white fences surrounding the head-stone and foot- 
stone at each grave, is added to the prospect. 

A little after three we arrive at Morgan City, a happy 
relief, with its neat frame houses in well kept gardens, 
enclosed by equally well kept fences. Electric lights 
on the streets and trees along the walks make the place 
seem quite metropolitan. Here, as at all other stop¬ 
ping places, great crowds of people, negroes, “poor 
whites” and others, are at hand to watch the “train 
go by,” an event which they would not miss for a 
good deal. 

While the train crosses the great brown Teche, 
halting in midstream over some stern-wheelers about 
to descend the river, one of our friends stops his smok¬ 
ing for a minute, to point out the guns on the old fort, 
where the Confederate veterans saluted the American 
flag, July 4, 1893. Thirty years before some three 
thousand rebels, stationed here, were routed, the Fed- 
erals taking the place and holding it until the close of 
the war, when it went to decay. Now it has been 
converted into a park. 

The boats on the river interest us; we learn how 
they are sent far up the Teche for rice and sugar and 
cotton, which they bring down to the railway, return¬ 
ing with supplies for the plantations above. The river 
itself is the Atchafalaya (At-sha-fah-lay-yah) so 
wide here that it is sometimes called Berwick Bay 
(Burr-wick). Nine miles above the Teche empties 
into it, the waters flowing together for some thirty 
miles into the Mexican Gulf. 

Over on the other side of the river is a fleeting pic¬ 
ture of the quaint old South. 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


29 


THE LAND OF THE PICKANINNY 

Negro cabins are built in one long row, and the old 
darkey mammies, with bandanas round their heads, 
a white kerchief folded in a “V” on the back, blue 
waist, and skirt of black and white check, are seated 
on every step. Younger men and women lean on the 
fence posts before the unpainted cabins, watching the 
passing cars. Children—darling pickaninnies—toddle 
among the pink roses in the “yards.” The climate 
here is as in the early spring at home, so that the amount 
of clothing worn is often the least that the law allows, 
frequently only a shirt minus sleeves. 

Tramps, carrying their bundles on the end of a cane 
on the shoulder, are also frequently seen at the road¬ 
side. 

As we ride on, we find ourselves listening to a 
heavy-set Southern planter giving a planter’s account 
of life in the region. 

“In the summer,” he is telling, “the cane cutters 
here receive from eighty to ninety cents a day, accord¬ 
ing to strength, and this holds true for men, 
women and children. As to their capacity for work, 
the overseers get to be expert judges of this. In 
the summer, quite frequently, on the other hand, the 
cane-workers are paid a dollar and a quarter a day, 
and then we board them for twenty-five cents. Usually 
these cutters come to love the overseer, as they might 
an elder brother. When they dislike him, however, 
in a body, they will refuse to work.” 

“No,” in answer to a question, “the Southerner 
hasn’t come to have quite the regard for the blaok 


30 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


man which you have in the North. I am sorry to 
say that throughout this part of the country you will 
still have many whites tell you that the negro must 
be regarded as an animal, and not as a human, and 
that you must keep him in his place or you will regret it.” 

This is quite different from what we were led to be¬ 
lieve when we read our papers and magazines up North! 

A long oil train cuts off his remarks, but when we 
next hear him he is telling how the cities are spoiling 
the colored man for work on the plantations, as the 
labor is lighter and the pay better; for on the cane- 
fields they must work from sun-up to sunset, except¬ 
ing for an hour at noon. 

He is recommending that as it is clouding up and 
may rain, and then we would not see the state at its 
best, we get off at the next stopping place and visit 
Fairview or Avoca (A-voke-ah), two of the typical 
plantations of the South, all of which, like these two, 
have fanciful, poetic names. 

THE REGION OF CANOES 

We look in vain for roads in this part of the country. 
There are none, as we understand the term, for the 
roads here are in reality waterways, intricate bayous, 
and deep, navigable streams, the way through which, 
as through the canals of lower California we are to visit 
later, it takes years to learn. Through these bayous go 
the oyster gatherers, for the vast shell beds are near 
here, and millions of oysters are shipped from the local 
packing establishments annually. In fact, from the 
cars, we can see some of the luggers tied to the banks, 
each sloop bringing a hundred and twenty-five to 



THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


31 


two hundred barrels from the great beds in the Gulf 
(a distance of perhaps an hour or two), netting the 
skipper a set rate of a dollar a barrel. We had never 
thought of the oyster as an important article of food 
until we came here to Louisiana, but in this section 
of the state a hardy set of men are engaged in the 
hazardous and certainly arduous work of gathering 
them the greater part of the year. 

From Girard Lake (Gee-rard) near by, catfish are 
also taken for shipment. Where to? We study our 
geography. What sections of the country would be 
supplied from here? Obviously Texas, Kansas, Mis¬ 
souri, Louisiana, and Arkansas. If we cared to make 
the thirty-mile side trip to the lake, we would see 
fishermen everywhere hauling in their lines, while the 
tugs of the dealers came about collecting the fish in 
floating crates and towing them to the shore, where 
expert dressers prepare the fish at the rate of one a 
minute. In fact we learn that a darkey expert can 
take a twenty-pound catfish, swing it upon a hook, 
take off the fins, slip the skin off in one pull, then 
disembowel the fish^and have head and tail chopped 
off before sixty seconds are counted. 

Alligator hides are another queer product that came 
formerly from this part of Louisiana—as many as 
thirty thousand hides going out of here at a shipment. 
Latterly, however, the supply has been exhausted and 
luckily, the demand is not so great. 

THE SUGARBOWL OF LOUISIANA 

We are beginning really to wonder if there is no 
end to cane plantations in Louisiana. The long, 


32 A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 

yellow leaves cover the ground for mile after mile, 
save where they have been gathered into great stacks, 
ready for sale to the paper factories, or where they 
have been burnt, that the rich soil might be plowed 
into furrows. Aside from a lumber mill or two, 
sugar-cane is everywhere! No wonder they call this 
the Sugarbowl of the state. 

Still, there are other industries. One man 
made a fortune out here, for instance, by taking 
cypress land, cutting the timber, and then sending 
boats into the swamps to bring it out (by snaking, 
as it called) to where larger boats can collect it. 

At Patterson we are only eight feet above the 
sea, and out of the flats in the distance rise French 
church spires, that again take us back in fancy to 
Normandy. Manors and negro cabins, great sugar 
mills and perhaps a wooden bridge swung by hand 
to let a lugger sail by, alone would greet our 
eye, could we visit these towns. 

The bearded cypresses have again begun to replace 
the palms and the reeds when we reach the New 
Iberia district. Here in early days there were 
other industries, connected with the salt mines. 
Salt was then rare in the United States, so that, 
when worked by slaves, as they were up to 1828, 
the mines yielded handsome profits. After that, 
however, they were abandoned until 1861, when 
the price of salt rose to eleven dollars a barrel in New 
Orleans, and they could be profitably revived. Then 
a great vein of rock salt was discovered right here in 
the Sugarbowl of Louisiana, and this, too, was drained. 
The owner received for its produce not less than three 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


33 


million dollars, but as all this was in Confederate paper 
money, at the close of the war he found himself pen¬ 
niless. 

“Away ouc here, m far western Louisiana/ 7 our 
friend again informs us, “many of these plantations, 
like the manors of old, are almost independent of the 
world. They raise their own sugar and cotton, their 
own fruits, grains, vegetables, beef and mutton. On 
them you can kill bear and deer; there are fish and 
wild duck, geese and snipe. In fact, with but few ex¬ 
ceptions, they raise absolutely everything needed to 
sustain life.” 

Just beyond another leafless cotton-field we stop at a 
little station. Some very black and some very light 
negro boys come down to sell us cane—at any price. 
Instead of buying, we toss them pennies—just as 
we did on the dock at Naples in our other Little 
Journey, in order to enjoy the fun of watching them 
scramble, one over the other, for them. There is a 
settlement close by, New Iberia itself, where some 
young negresses, in gay blue and red dresses, are out 
among the trees before elegant old pillared and im¬ 
maculately white Southern homes, watching the passing 
train. 

With evening, a delightful balmy sunset breeze 
comes up, though it is not quite a quarter to five. On 
the observation platform, to vary the monotony of the 
endless sugar-cane, people are chatting or playing at 
cards. There is nothing but cane until La Fayette 
(French pronunciation) which we reach with the sunset 
half an hour later, so we enjoy ourselves in the same way. 


34 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


In the dusk, a great oil-train rolls by, and we notice 
for the first time, that our own track has been oiled, in 
order to lay the dust. 

With the deepening dusk, it grows cool outside, 
and all come into the car. While the days are balmy 
and very delightful for traveling, the evenings and 
nights are quite cool. Louisiana has a semitropical 
climate with hot summers and warm winters, except 
in the northern part of the state, where the thermometer 
may fall several degrees below the freezing point. 
Here, however, there are only three months in which 
frost occurs. The rainfall varies from sixty inches in 
the southeast to fifty in the north. 

Twilight finds us at Ocott (Oh-kott), another wee 
hamlet, with the cotton bales in a great pile on the 
platform. We wonder how far we shall get by bed¬ 
time. La Fayette the maps show to be one hundred 
and forty-five miles from New Orleans. Already the 
newsboy is coming through with Galveston (Gal-ves'- 
tun) and Houston papers. Houston (Hoos'-tun), we 
find, is three hundred and sixty-three miles from the 
Crescent City. 

The first of the three calls for supper in the dining 
car is given, and we start thither in order to make sure 
of a place. Our vis-a-vis at table is a young Creole 
attorney from New Orleans, and at the rate of half a 
mile a minute or so, he tells us of the Creole ways—* 
how the enclosed garden is still attached to every 
Creole home, although the younger generation is 
dropping more exclusive customs. 

By the time the waiter has pocketed our tip, and we 
are back in our Pullman, night is fairly on. 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


35 


For our after-supper chat we seek the observation 
platform, while some of our friends remain to play 
cards within. It is bed-time when we stop at Beau¬ 
mont (Boh'-mond)—to our surprise well within the 
Lone Star State. 

THE BEGINNING OF THE LONE STAR STATE 

We sleep through quite a large portion of the largest 
state in the Union—Texas. 

How many of us have any real idea of the size of this 
“Lone Star State”? Probably very few. 

In the morning, on picking up one of the railway pub¬ 
lications, we find the facts stated quite concisely. 

“Texas,” says' the book, “extends eight hundred 
miles from east to west, and seven hundred and fifty 
from north to south. This is almost the distance from 
New York to Chicago on the one hand, and from 
Chicago to New Orleans on the other, or say from San 
Francisco to Salt Lake. 

“Texas, moreover, is eleven times as large as New 
York State, two hundred and eleven times as big as 
Rhode Island. It has four hundred and eleven miles 
of coast line, although we are little accustomed to 
speaking of the coast of Texas. Its navigable rivers 
are equal, in length, to those of any five other states 
in the Union. All in all, there are 265,789 square 
miles of territory in Texas, over which there extends 
more than sixteen thousand miles of railway. The 
value of agricultural and manufactured products from 
this state is set at $185,000,000. The permanent school 
fund, in itself, is a hundred million dollars. 

“In addition to the best known products, Texas 


36 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


yields coal, iron, copper and gypsum, rock salt, and 
asphalt, mica, granite and petroleum; and its forests 
are far from inconsiderable.” 

During the night, we learn that we passed Sour Lake, 
a queer pool, famous for its mud baths, and the many 



A TOWN IN WESTERN TEXAS 


thriving towns dotting the section between the Sabine 
(Say'-bean) and San Antonio, towns separated from 
one another almost entirely by rice fields. Near 
Crosby, eighty-four miles from the Louisiana line, 
we crossed a historic site, the scene of the San Jacinto 
(Ja-sin'-toe) fight, April 12, 1836, which, practically 
speaking, gained for Texas her independence. 

Houston, the State capital, too, was passed, and now 








THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


37 


that we are up and out of our berths, we are pulling 
into San Antonio (Sahn An-ton'-e-oh). 

It is a wet, foggy day, though very warm, and we are 
loth to quit the cozy dining-car, with its steaming 
coffee and rolls, for the murky outer world, but it will 
never do to miss the opportunity of a peep at San 
Antonio. 


SAN ANTONIO 

We descend from the train and set forth to explore 
the city; for city it is, in every sense of the word. The 
first two decades of the twentieth century have wit¬ 
nessed the growth of the big sprawling frontier town 
into a fine modern health resort so metropolitan in 
appearance that it fairly takes our breath away. 

With a population of more than 160,000, San An¬ 
tonio can boast of a host of handsome modern buildings, 
including many excellent hotels, which cater to a large 
tourist patronage. For the mild, semitropical climate, 
the mineral waters, and the hot sulphur springs com¬ 
mend the city to wealthy travelers as a kind of winter 
playground, where they may recoup their health and 
play golf. It has between 300 and 400 miles of well- 
paved streets, admirable sewer and street-cleaning 
systems, and a supply of pure water (drawn from 
seventeen artesian wells) large enough for a city of half 
a million people. 

Among the attractions of the place are the imposing 
San Fernando Cathedral, founded in 1734; the old 
Spanish cemetery; and several fine parks. Here is also 
located the Stinson School of Aviation and Fort Sam 
Houston, the largest army post in the United States. 


38 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


Of course we want to see the Alamo (Ah-lah-moh), 
about which half the history of Texas is gathered. It 
is built in what seems to us the mission style—silent 
and suffering from age—a reminder of the stirring 
days when “Remember the Alamo” was the watch¬ 
word of the West. 

ON AGAIN INTO THE CATTLE-LANDS 

We must now retrace our steps, for the train, like 
time, waits for no man. 

We pass at first into groves of low shrubs, barren at 



AN OLD-TIME TEXAS STAGE 










THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


39 


this season save for tremendous bunches of the green- 
leafed mistletoe, hanging like hornets' nests from their 
limbs. Undoubtedly, we think, this is the region of 
the “Texas forests" of which we have heard. Very 
soon, however, we shall discover our mistake. 

At a little wayside station there are huge stock- 
yards that seem to us a miniature of Chicago's Packing- 
town. In the vast prairie meadows, there are thous- * 
ands of cattle—“bunched," as they say out here— 
ready to be shipped, for we are entering the cattle 
country. 

We are coming to the land of the cow-boy, and we 
thrill with excitement at the news. We try to count 
the cattle. Strange to say it is easier than we suppose. 
Pretty soon the cattle become less numerous. We 
question another fellow-traveler out on the observa¬ 
tion platform. 

“Aren’t these the ranches of Texas?" 

‘ ‘ Those ? Ranches ?'' 

He laughs. 

“No, indeed, those are ranges! Don’t you see, there 
are thousands and thousands of acres in the plots." 

Then he goes on to explain. Out in the East and 
Middle West, we always think of ranches as places 
where cattle alone are raised, and then by the 
thousands. In the Southwest, however, the word 
“ranch" simply means a small farm, and so there are 
vegetable ranches, and bee-ranches and goat-ranches 
and apple-ranches and any other ranch you may 
desire. But the cattle—they roam upon “ranges," 
which are seldom less than four or five hundred acres 
in extent. This is because the herbage is compara^ 


40 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


tively sparse and the animals must have abundant 
room to range, in order that they may be sleek and fat. 

A SPRING ROUND-UP ON THE PLAINS 

Laying aside his San Antonio paper, our friend then 
proceeds to give us an explanation of the real cow-boy 
life of to-day. 

“The herds that we see,” he explains, “do not belong 
to one rancher, but to perhaps a dozen or more, who 



ONLY SAGE BRUSH 


take up the land in common. Then the animals are 
turned loose to browse, under the general inspection 
of the cowboys, or as the Mexicans are termed, va- 
queros (vah-kair'-ohs). Often some of the animals get 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


41 


in among the buttes or denser undergrowth, and may 
not be seen by the owner for a year at a time. 

“Then, in the spring, all the cow-boys from the 
ranch-house interested meet at one rancher’s home. 
They wear their best suits that day, and are especially 
proud of their hats and of their saddles, both of which 
will be adorned with ornaments of solid silver, and 
sometimes even of gold. 

' ' They are mounted on fine horses, the range is divided 
between them, and away they go to their farthest points. 
Then, as at a fox-hunt in the Blue Grass region of 
Kentucky, the cow-boys drive all the cattle, steers, 
cows and calves gradually in toward a common center. 

“Nor is this as easy as it looks. Yearling calves, 
' heifers/ are frequently fractious, and gallop off, the 
others following close at their heels. Then, too, some 
of the bulls will not hesitate to 'go’ for the vaquero, 
and the lasso must be brought into play. Many cattle 
too, are hidden in the undergrowth, and it is no easy 
matter to get at them to rout them out, 

“At last, however, the cattle are brought to the center 
agreed on, which is known as the 'corral’ (core-rell'). 

“There the calves, who always accompany their 
mothers, and hence are readily recognized as to owner¬ 
ship, are branded with the same name as that which 
the cow may bear. To watch the skillful vaquero 
'throw’ an animal, apply the red hot branding-iron 
to the skin, and then release the newly branded calf, 
all in a trice, is a sight the novice never forgets. 

“When once the animals are all branded, they are 
turned loose again to roam the plains for another year. 

“When a rancher needs a certain number of head of 


42 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


cattle, he simply sends his cowboys out to bring in the 
desired lot that bear his brand. 

“That, of course, is the business side of the spring 
round-up. After it come the sports. There is fancy 
riding and such games as ‘polo* and the like. Form¬ 
erly there were examples of fancy cattle throwing, but 
as the cowboys would practice for this on the plains the 
year round and so frequently cripple their owners 7 
stock in the experiment, the law has forbidden the 
sport. 

“A favorite game, however, is to bury a rooster up 
to the neck in the sand, and then have the cowboys 
ride past on a gallop, and lasso the wee bit of head. 

“Of course there are feasts at the round-up, and often 
prizes are distributed. Then, the long year opens up 
again. 77 

Meantime we notice a wave of excitement passing 
over the passengers in the car. On almost every trip 
of the overland trains there will be one or more celeb¬ 
rities aboard—either in a stateroom, a special car, or 
else in the regular Pullman coaches, for the class of 
people making this transcontinental ride is well-nigh 
the same as that on the great ocean liners. In tills 
case, it may be a Japanese envoy, and plans are already 
being laid to catch a glimpse of him at the very next 
halt of the train. 

In fact, some people begin a search of the cais, start¬ 
ing with the observation car at this end, then through 
the three sleepers, peering especially into their smoking 
compartments, and even through the day coaches as 
far as the baggage car, far in the front, in search of the 
object of their quest. This results in their discovering 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


43- 


other acquaintances aboard, and they do not feel the 
expedition to have been wholly useless. 

THE PLAINS 

Meantime the train is ever bowling on over the end¬ 
less prairie plains. These are covered now with low, 
bare mesquite (mes'-keet) bushes, a plant we will 
come to know well before our Little Journey is over : 
as also with a smaller gray weed, and patches of another 
yellow, equally dry, grass. Between these we see the 
yellow, pebble-strewn earth, over which are scattered 
the cattle, seldom more than two or three in a group. 

Again, in stretches, there will be millions of low, 
barren trees, in which hang more of the greenish-yellow 



TOURISTS IN' THE SOUTHWEST 









44 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


bunches of mistletoe. Occasionally, as if for variety’s 
sake, there will rise a solitary green shrub, like a laurel. 
All the morning and well on into the afternoon, there 
will be little more than this to see. Of life there is 
nothing in sight anywhere, excepting only those semi- 
occasional cows. 

LIFE ON THE TRANSCONTINENTAL TRAINS 

Those of us who have taken the Little Journeys 
abroad and experienced the life on the famous railways 
there, are interested in noting how time is passed on a 
monotonous section of a journey in the great South¬ 
west. 

Some of the people are reading magazines (for the 
papers are by this time stale), others books from the 
car’s library. Still others are writing at a well supplied 
desk; the rest are simply dozing. 

It is a welcome call, indeed, when the porter pro¬ 
claims “Dinner ready in the dining-car.” 

WHEN UNCLE SAM RAISED CAMELS 

Over the veal cutlet and the Saratogas, we hear 
another interesting story of this section of our country 
—Uncle Sam’s camel experiment. 

It seems that away back in the fifties, Uncle Sam 
thought there would be nothing like camels to transport 
his supplies across the deserts of the Southwest. So 
he sent to Africa for quite a herd, and they were put 
into service in this section between San Antonio and 
El Paso, where there are many stretches of from forty 
to ninety miles without water. 

‘‘When the camels set out, it seems, all went well; 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


45 


but/’ our informant continues, “the chilly December 
winds troubled the animals, and each had to be wrapped 
about with a blanket. Then the Egyptian drivers, who 
had been brought with them, began shivering, as much 
with homesickness as cold. The rough, rocky trails, 
too, told on the feet of the camels, which are shaped 
like the foot of a cow, and are without protection on the 
base, so that the mat or pad wore off, and serious stone 
bruises resulted. Shoes for the camels were impossible 
as there was no hoof to fasten them to. Leather 
sandals, which were tried, were altogether too costly.” 

There were innumerable other difficulties, so that at 
last the government gave up in disgust. The interest¬ 
ing part of the affair is, however, that those remaining 
of the herd of a hundred and thirty camels were turned 
loose to roam the desert at will. They wandered into 
the mountains, and for two or three decades afterwards 
occasional prospectors would tell of having run across 
one or two camels. 

Even now there are legends of seeing the camels on 
the deserts, whether these are true or not no one knows. 
Suffice it to say, that the remains of all the animals 
have not yet been discovered. 

THE HEAT OF THE DESERT 

Ladies in the observation car prepare to take their 
after-luncheon nap in the easy chairs, for we are now 
getting into an entirely different region of the South¬ 
west—the desert. 

Some of us have had preconceived ideas of the desert 
gained from our school geographies. Let us see if they 
accord with the reality; we see an endless, parched, 


46 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


dust-covered plain, with scattered areas of low. equally 
parched herbage, sage brush and mesquite, and a low- 
growing cactus. Down upon this pours a broiling sun, 
and here on the observation platform, w r here the air is 
tempered by the motion of the train, early in January, 
the thermometer is registering between eighty and 
ninety degrees. 

The dust added to the fierce heat drives us inside the 
car, and there another thermometer registers ninety- 
five. 

Outside, through the windows, we see vast white 
areas of earth, the white is the alkali in the soil, which 
we are told needs only water—irrigation—to make it 
very fruitful. We are now in the real Southwest, 
where the story of “ irrigation n is ever uppermost in 
people’s minds. 

Nor does the desert remain the same throughout. 
Higher forms of mesquite bushes, in endless quantities, 
succeed the alkali tracts, and save for the oil-tanks 
along the track (oil supplanting coal on these lines), 
and, at one place, a lone tent in the w T aste of prairie, 
where some prospector has camped, w^e will see abso¬ 
lutely no sign of life. 

Then again a bit of mistletoe, or off on the sky-line, 

low hill or butte will be hailed as the greatest of 
curiosities. 


A DESERT TOW r N 

At Spofford, we get a peep at a typical desert town. 
There is the post-office in a tiny, tent-shaped hut, a 
store selling general merchandise, a barber shop and 
saloon—that is all; and surrounding this little cluster 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 47 

on every side is the endless prairie. Customers must 
ride for countless miles to patronize these places. 

After Spofford there is again only the endless stretch 
of desert. At a mile-stone “703 miles from New 
Orleans,” a Mexican, in great sombrero, that adds a 
a deeper shade to his already dark skin, sits on his horse 
in the sunshine to watch the “train go by.” All that 
we have ever read of the loneliness and heat of the 
desert is recalled at this sight. At another stop an old 
harpist is playing for what the tourists may toss him. 

By and by there are more areas of burning sand, 
hidden by tall mesquite. It is so hot on the platform 
that even a young girl from Seattle, who has been 
studying history for an examination on her return and 
who has wished to remain undisturbed, yields to the 
heat and comes in. As everyone is dozing, because of 
the heat and the monotony of endless sand, she can 
study her “Rome” in peace. Even when she lifts her 
eyes from the page for a moment, there is nothing but 
the pale blue sky and the sage to divert her attention. 
These endless tracts of desert are very deceptive. It 
is so easy for the traveler to be mistaken as to distances, 
and to become lost on the arid plain. But for the 
distant stations, lone outposts, where tough-looking 
dark-skinned Mexican boys loiter, life is absolutely 
invisible. 


THE FAMOUS RIO GRANDE 

At last there comes a diversion. We strike the 
famous Rio Grande (Spanish pronunciation), “The 
Grand River,” and follow its course. Anywhere else 
this river would be termed a creek, being a narrow 


48 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


stream, much like the Mill creek,emptying into the Ohio 
at Cincinnati, and heavy with mud. Here, however, it 
is considered a great stream, for water is at a premium. 
Its banks are lined with cotton-fields, and there are 
cattle in its meadows, and, at one place, even sheep. 



STREET ALONG THE RIO GRANDE 


Then, too, there are great palisades and canons to 
make it interesting, reminding us of the canons near 
Sofia, in Bulgaria. 

We venture out on the platform again, but the dust, 
heavy with alkali, drives us in. How the man in the 
great sombrero, who is plowing out there, stands it, we 
do not know. . 







THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


49 


This seems to be the “knob country" of Texas. 
The fertile prairies along the river, stretching to the 
pebbly shore, are overgrown with a tall, feathery, 
pampas-grass. 

With the river on our left, and beyond the track the 
cliffs rising in ledges of great blocks of stone, with the 
canons and other rugged ledges, dry and sweltering, 
the region appears to us like what we have read of 
Death Valley. When, later on, we come to Death 
Valley, however, we shall find it otherwise, save for, 
perhaps, certain queer bluffs that seem to be made up of 
layers of rock, while from their tops extend the endless 
mesas of sage-brush and low green cacti. It is a torrid, 
beastly land, and as the windows are all closed against 
the dust, and the shades drawn on the sunny side, we 
think of nothing but how we may pass the time with 
the least exertion. Finally we follow the example of 
others aboard, and take to ginger ale, which we find 
cooling and refreshing, and to a light story. 

By and by sheep begin to appear amid the scanty 
vegetation of the deserts, and we wonder how their 
owners avoid getting lost when in pursuit of the rams. 
Later, when we get on the Mojave (Mo'-ha-vay) 
Desert, we will learn of their trails and guide- 
marks. 

We now, too, see another produce characteristic of 
the desert—the yucca, crowned at this season with the 
dried flower stalks of the last blossoming time. Over 
the yuccas are hills, blue in distance, that seem very 
near, but which, as a matter of fact, are not less than 
fifty miles away. So clear is the air here, so bright the 
sun, that only experts are safe in reckoning distances. 


50 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


OYER TOWARD THE PECOS 

The train is now traveling at a fearful rate of speed, 
for on the deserts there is little or nothing to check its 
course. The motion cools the air at the open window, 
and so, sitting beside it in company with a young lad 
from Washington state, we fall into a pleasant chat. 

As we thunder over a bridge, thrown across a great 
beautiful canon, he exclaims with delight, “The 



THE MIGHTY PECOS 


Pecos !” It ipdicates that we are very near our desti¬ 
nation—as “nearness” goes in the West. 

He further explains that this whole region is known 
to the natives as over “Toward the Pecos,” and in 
pioneer days was the genuine Southwest. 






THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


51 


“The bridge across the Pecos is one of the most 
famous of the United States.” Just then the train 
stops two full minutes on the trestle, in order that we 
may gaze down in wonderment at the palisades to the 
right and left, and perhaps take a few snapshots with 
the kodak. 

At ten minutes to five, we are off again over the 
plains of sage-brush, the newsboy takes the opportunity 
to profit by our enthusiasm, while it is at its height, by 
selling packs of playing-cards containing views of the 
route, and also post-cards of the bridge. 

About supper time, a few huddling frame buildings in 
the lonely plains attract us, these marking the ranch 
belonging to the famous Lilly Langtry. It is one of the 
great ranches of this country. How they manage to 
kill time there, or in the lone village some miles beyond, 
where we notice a sign reading: 


JUSTICE OF THE PEACE 
THE LAW WEST OF THE PECOS 


is the inevitable question that rises in our minds. 

While we sup in the dining-car, the gorgeous desert 
sunsets hold us spell-bound. We have seen their 
duplicates only on summer nights on the Mediter¬ 
ranean. Up from the dull plains of brush the sky 
seems to circle in gorgeous violets in the east, while the 
western half of the firmament is one fanfare of all the 
more brilliant colors. 

Night, however, comes suddenly; at 6:30 it is dark. 
In the cars, people while away the time as best they 



52 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


may, reading, writing and looking up guide-books. 
To-day, we find, in going from Houston to San Antonio 
(572 miles distant from New Orleans), we have covered 
two hundred and nine miles, while between San 
Antonio and Rosenfeld, where we arrive at about 
10:10 to-night, three hundred and thirty-two more 
were added. In fact, we are only six miles short of a 
thousand west of the Crescent City as we sink to sleep 
in our berths. 


THE THIRD DAY BY RAIL 

When we rise at about ten minutes to seven, the 
morning of our third day on the train, it is still pitch 
dark outside; the stars are shining, and we must dress 
by the light of the wash-room lamps. The heat drives 
us to the platform again, and we inquire as to our 
whereabouts. 

We learn that we are somewhere in the vicinity of 
Sabine (Say-bine), Texas, about eleven hundred and 
sixty-three miles from New Orleans. We have mounted, 
moreover, to an elevation of about thirty-six hundred 
feet above the sea. In the night, in fact, we passed 
through Paisano (Pie'-sah-no), the summit of the 
route, which lies 5,082 feet above the sea-level. 

Learning that our stopping place, El Paso (LPah-sew), 
is not really so very much farther away (1,192 miles 
from New Orleans), we get our things in order ready to 
leave the train, and then prepare to enjoy the tardy 
dawn. Off in the west the sky is still a deep blue-black. 
In the east it is red just over the foot-hills. The rest 
of the firmament is a clear blue. As the day grows 
older, the whole sky becomes blue. 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


53 


While we are at breakfast, a long train of cars filled 
with the Texas steers flies past, the animals “bunched” 
close, side by side, in the cars, and alternating heads 
and tails to each side of the car, a position, perhaps, 
necessary in order that their great horns may not 
become entangled one with another’s. 

THE FIRST ADOBES 

The first adobe (a-dough'-bee) huts are now awaiting 
our inspection. Adobe, or as they say down there, 



an adobe hut 


“do-be,” is simply the clay of the region put up over 
laths or brush, to form houses and barns In a rain¬ 
less land the dobe serves its purpose admirably, being 





54 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


cheap, abundant and enduring. Consequently, long 
before we are out of the Southwest we shall be pretty 
tired of seeing it. 

Right here, however, the houses made of it seem often 
lone and sad, scattered singly in the desert. Here and 
there are little villages, where each residence is built 
square, the yellow earth walls pierced with neat win¬ 
dows of many panes, that open to right and left of the 
door. A few drear trees will stand close to the door¬ 
step, and, in addition, there will be a ladder giving 
access to the roof, on which place the inmates often 
sleep, through the summer. The aspect of these vil¬ 
lages is dreary and reminds us of those of the cliff- 
dwellers of which we have read. 

At half-past eight the journey through the desert 
comes to an end. The train slows up and stops and the 
porter calls, “El Paso.” It seems too good to be true. 
We are at the first great point of interest on our long 
pilgrimage. 


EL PASO, A GATEWAY CITY 

El Paso acquires a double interest when we consider 
that it is the only large city in the Southwest situated 
on the boundary line between the United States and 
Mexico; and therefore it is a kind of gateway into 
Mexico. It is located on the Rio Grande in a moun¬ 
tainous region and has an elevation of 4,000 feet. 

Its brief life history reads like a typical western 
romance. In 1880, its site was a barren wilderness of 
sagebrush and cactus, with no sign of human habitation. 
Seven years later, the spot boasted a few adobe shacks 
and a lumber yard. To-day the gateway city is a 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


55 


modern metropolis of almost 78,000 people, occupying 
eight square miles of territory. 

What has wrought the miracle? Several construc¬ 
tive forces have been at work; but by far the greatest 
of these is irrigation. Irrigation on an immense scale 
was introduced into southwestern Texas in 1916, when 
the Elephant Butte Dam was completed. This giant 
among dams, located near El Paso, is 318 feet long 
from bedrock bottom to the top, and its crest, which 
extends in a straight line, measures 1,674 feet. Its 
reservoir forms a lake 45 miles long and 193 feet deep, 
and its storage capacity is 50 per cent, greater than 
that of the famous Assuan Dam on the Nile; also it 
can store twice as much water as the Roosevelt Dam 
in Arizona. Experts assert that it can supply the El 
Paso, Juarez, and Mesilla valleys with enough water to 
irrigate them four dry years in succession, if necessary. 

Thus the Elephant Butte Dam waters an area of 
180,000 acres, the center of which is the city of El 
Paso. What city wouldn’t wax large and prosperous 
under such conditions? Thanks to irrigation, orchard 
crops have become very valuable and the gateway city 
finds itself an-important fruit market. The livestock 
industry received fresh impetus, and El Paso is more 
than ever a great horse and mule market. 

On all sides we see signs of a remarkable industrial 
development: smelters, cement plants, flour and wool¬ 
finishing mills,, lumber mills, and other factories. We 
see modern office buildings of substantial design, from 
four to ten stories high, well-lighted streets, miles and 
miles of asphalt pavements and cement sidewalks, 
and many miles of electric street car lines. 

As in San Antonio, the hotels are noticeably luxurious 


56 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


and modern; for here also, the tourist trade is import¬ 
ant. Particularly handsome and well-equipped, too, 
are the sanitaria for the treatment of tuberculosis, 
rheumatism, and other diseases, since a large percentage 
of the visitors are ill people in search of health. 

After visiting three of the city’s finest buildings, the 
courthouse, the Y. M. C. A. headquarters, and the 
$500,000 high school, we develop a curiosity to see 
what type of civilization is across the river from all 
this modern magnificence. As the Mexican town of 
Cuidad Juarez is only the distance of a five-minute 
ride from El Paso, we hail a passing street car whose 
destination is Mexico, and are soon on our way across 
the border. 


ACROSS THE RIVER IN MEXICO 

As our car rumbles over the bridge that spans the 
Rio Grande, Juarez looms up, itself the gateway into 
a quaint old civilization very unlike the one we have 
just left. Here we find many quaint types of Mexicans, 
ancient buildings, and customs so strange that we feel 
as if we were in another world. 

The houses of Juarez remind us of those described in 
“Ben Hur”: square, and of adobe, coated over with a 
colored plaster or painted in imitation of blocks of 
cement. In the front there is always a porch, and each 
of the prettier places has a garden of plants, protected 
by hemp or sacking covers against what is termed the 
winter down here. 

On our right is a barber’s shop, and we notice in pass¬ 
ing that the barber keeps his hat on his head while 
shaving his customers. Next door to him is one of the 
numerous souvenir stands with which Juarez abounds, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


57 


and in the window the cycles of pictures of the bull 
fights tempt us sadly—these and the Mexican drawn 
work or tidies of linen, in open patterns. Nor are these 
all the novelties prepared for the tourist dropping into 
Juarez. Pictures of cock-fights, made of the gayest 
cock-feathers are offered on every hand. Then, too, 



COCK FIGHTERS, MEXICO 


there are stores where lizards are sold and others that 
make a specialty of drawn-work from the interior of 
Mexico, where wages are low, that is as fine as the 
proverbial cobweb, and whole scarfs of which can be 
rolled into a ball and held in the palm of the hand. 

Following in the wake of some Indian girls, their 
coal-black hair parted in the middle, and scarlet 







58 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


blankets thrown over more modern dresses, heighten¬ 
ing their picturesque appearance, we come to the 
Mission church, about which are gathered hawkers of 
imitation flowers, candies and the like. Both the 
church and the district municipal offices face upon a 
plaza, or open square to which the town jail forms a 
third side, and the market the fourth. 

A QUEER MARKET FOR ONE SO CLOSE TO THE BORDER 

All manner of queer things are sold on this market. 
There is, for instance, a round brown cake, about four 
inches in diameter, which is made of pumpkin, and is 
a brilliant yellow inside. This sells for eight cents, or 
at one cent the slice. Mexican money, of course, is 
employed, but they are so close to the border that our 
American coins are current, and the price in these is 
always just one-half what it would be in the Mexican. 

Candied pumpkin, in rich brown treacle, and the 
chili, which resembles a long okra (which opens when 
ripe, exposing the white seeds inside), as well as red 
peppers and dried beans and okra itself, are every¬ 
where. Then there are stands of water-jugs made of 
the brown, native pottery and tiny little jugs and jars 
for the doll-houses, in white and maroon. Tied to the 
different stalls frequently, will be a pair of wiry game¬ 
cocks, prepared to fight whenever their masters can 
arrange a match. 

Peanut sellers are everywhere—these and venders 
of what appear to be curiously carved rattles, but 
which, in reality, are sticks for stirring chololate. 
Another feature of this market are the bunches of 
clean, tiny brooms, about the size of a shaving-brush, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


59 


but bound about in gay paper, and none of them over 
six inches in length. 

There is a restaurant here in the heart of the market 
and if we wish we can partake of extremely thin white 



MARKET SCENE AT JUAREZ 

pancakes which will be served in stacks right on the 
table itself; they are used to absorb the red, well 
spiced gravy of the meat. 

From the market to the prison is no far cry, and we 
will rather enjoy walking past the pompous sentries 
into the interior court of the jail, upon which the several 
cells open. Aside, however, from the meager furnish¬ 
ings, these recall so much of what we saw on our 
Little Journey to Mexico as not to hold us long. 







60 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


Those of us, too, who did not make that other Little 
Journey will want to take a peep inside the Mission 
church, and after that at the great bull-ring. As these, 
however, are identical with that we have already seen, 
we can spare them but little space in our note-books. 

Returning in the electric cars to the United States, 
we note a clever idea—the placing of advertisements in 
the handles of the straps for passengers who are forced 
to stand. 


the land of gems 

In El Paso again we will want to watch some tur¬ 
quoise lapidary at work, for some of the finest tur¬ 
quoise in the world come from this region. The 
wonderful Tiffany mine is not many miles away. If 
we had time we should enjoy a visit to this treasure 
house, for it would remind us of the cavern where Ah 
Baba found the loot of the forty thieves. Only a cer¬ 
tain number of months of each year do the Tiffanys 
work this mine, in order to keep down the supply, and 
then, for the rest, the great iron door, which closes the 
entrance to it, is kept locked and closely guarded. 

Turquoise are mined either right on the surface of 
the earth or as far down as a hundred and fifty feet. 
After blasting the rock, it is broken into smaller 
nuggets, and these are sorted then into any one of six 
different grades, according to purity and the shade of 
blue. 

The matrix or foreign substance found in the tur¬ 
quoise frequently appears in very curious forms— 
trees, rivers, even indistinct shapes of animals being 
found—and, in larger stones, this is much coveted. A 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


61 


stone the size of a robin’s egg, and abounding in such 
figures, is cheap, the lapidary tells us, at forty dollars. 

We enjoy watching him first cut the raw material, 
then rough down the stone on a carborundum wheel, 
and after that, when perhaps two-thirds the original 
weight of the stone is gone, polishing on wheels of 
varying grits down to the finest. It would take per- 



THE PROSPECTOR 


haps two hours to see him finish a stone, fresh from the 
mine, but we do not care to linger so long. 

What claims to be a ranch outfitting store next 
attracts our eye. When we get inside we find that it 
costs more than we supposed for a cowboy to “rig up” 
in style. For state occasions, the cowboy invests in the 




62 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


most expensive luxuries. Stirrups which are silver 
plated and cost ten dollars apiece, while the ordinary 
ones cost but fifty cents; spurs for the same price, often 
inlaid with gold, and hats encircled with cord on cord 
of silver rope, which are considered cheap at fifty to 
seventy dollars, these are just a few of their extrava¬ 
gances. Moreover, the pistols, carbines, and the like, 
also cost not a little, so that the cowboy is far from real¬ 
izing the idea we had formed of his primitive poverty. 
Even for his most ordinary attire, it costs, we are told, 
as much as eighty dollars to fit out the vaquero from 
head to foot. 


THE GREAT SMELTERS 

We are here in the heart of the mining region, and 
while there are no mines close by, a car marked “Smel¬ 
ter,” happening along seems to indicate something of 
interest. Boarding it, we are given another oppor¬ 
tunity of seeing the neat little homes of El Paso, with 
the ladies cycling about on the pavements, and the 
Mexicans plodding countryward. Arrived at our 
destination, we see that the huge smelter stands on a 
bluff, but cannot obtain admission to it. 

We return in time for our evening meal, and after 
supper we walk cross to Juarez, where there is always 
something unique to interest us. Our pocketbooks 
suffer from these expeditions, for the souvenirs are 
well-nigh irresistible. 

The next morning the breakfast surprises us. There 
is such an air of simplicity about the hotel, with its 
negro waiters and the like, that we feel we may venture 
on ordering a hearty meal. The bill, however, is 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


63 


enormous. Strawberries are twenty-five cents for each 
portion, a grapefruit is the same price. Mackerel, too, 
cost a quarter, and even eggs, less than three of which 



A DESERT MINE 


they will not serve, bring the same price^ We realize 
that we are going west, where not only wages but 
prices are different. 

We have still all the morning to spend as we may in 
El Paso. Again and again, however, our steps lead 
across the border to the interesting sights which 
Juarez affords. 

WESTWARD HO! 

At twenty minutes to three we find ourselves once 
more aboard the train, bound “westward ho!” 





64 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


Great flats of sand-hills and sage brush stretch off 
from the Rio Grande, which is here a narrow stream 
disappearing among the foot-hills. Then there follow 
only endless wastes of pure white sand, on which grows 
nothing but the low sage brush. In places this sand 
has been beaten by the wind into perfect, rib-like 
waves. Low weeds grow in the gullies between them. 

For miles and miles this desert—a desert such as 
we have imagined the Sahara, stretches on and on, the 
buttes of sand scintillating in the sunlight. Not till we 
reach Pelea is there a lone station, in the heart of the 
sand wastes which then stretch off as far as the eye can 
see on every hand. Occasionally some high peak rises 
in this desert, seeming actually to quiver in the heat, 
as we view it from a crack in the shades, drawn at each 
opened window. 

When at last the distant mountains appear on the 
scene, a delightful breeze sweeps in through the win¬ 
dows, and the part of the desert which we are now 
traversing, is varied with a brown grass, some sage, and 
innumerable dried yucca blooms, and does not seem 
quite so dreary. But we wonder how in the pioneer 
days people could find courage to cross these miles of 
sandy waste, and we admire their daring, which we 
are now able to appreciate. 

There is always- something to interest in the desert. 
In places, for example, the sand seems covered over 
with a melted pitch, as though to keep it from shifting. 
At other points, the wind has made regular cuttings 
with results resembling greatly the cliff-dwellings of New 
Mexico. Ever on the right lies a mountain range, the 
bare mountains either purple or gray or both, as the 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


65 



sun plays upon them, or seeming to reflect the clear 
blue of the sky. Then there are undulating barrens, 
likewise formed by the wind, where there is absolutely 
nothing in sight but a few green yuccas. 

By and by, away off on the horizon, a great herd of 
ponies is visible. Later there are some goats. Then 
we know we are near a desert settlement, Strauss 
(Strow-ss). As outpost to Lanark (Lan'-ark), another 


BURNING SOTO WEED 

of these lonely towns, too, we see far away, a cowboy 
on his horse among the cacti. 

Pretty soon there are some ranges—ranges of 
thousands of acres—on which mighty herds are 
grazing. Each of these has its ranch-house and one 
long, poorly whitewashed shed containing a series of 




66 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


rooms for the u greasers ” just behind the railway sta¬ 
tion. The desert is changing to prairie, and there is 
mesquite again. On the far distant, mountains, snow is 
visible. So we know we are approaching a change 
in the landscape. 

At about half-past five the sun sinks behind the far 
mountains, where the snow is lying. This sunset at the 
edge of the prairie reminds us of those at sea. 

OUR AMERICAN HOLLAND 

At about six o’clock, hundreds of windmills appear, 
and on the desert prairie a miniature Holland seems 
to unfold before us. 

There is, however, this difference that whereas 
in Holland they use the mills to get rid of overabun¬ 
dant water, here they cannot have a similar object, for 
water is still at a premium. 

We will get off and investigate. The first result of 
our investigation is to discover that we are no longer in 
Texas, but in New Mexico, one of our youngest states, 
which was admitted to the Union in 1912. 

We have anticipated with some fear our nights in 
these small towns of the territories, for at home we 
always associate this part of our country with the bluff, 
sharpshooting ranger, ready to use his rifle on the least 
provocation, and with the unfriendly “Mexican,” who 
has crossed the border for the good of no one but him¬ 
self. 

We are, therefore, agreeably surprised to find away 
out here in Deming, a nice modern hotel, with even the 
luxury of electric light. 

In the twilight we walk up the main street of the 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


67 


town to see where Shakspere lives—for Deming has 
an editor by that name, whose residence is pointed out 
to strangers to amuse and puzzle them. We, however, 
are glad to secure this peep into a typical, better-class 



WINDMILLS AT DEMING 


home of the territories. The home of this gentleman 
is the usual one-story edifice with a low, cozy central 
hall, in which a stove burns merrily. A pair of steer 
horns serving as hat racks, show us we are still close to 
the cattle country. 

Of course, we ask the Colonel about the curious 
windmills and learn that down beneath Deming 
(Dem-ing'), there flows a so-called “lost river,” whose 
source is somewhere in the Mimbres (Mim'-bers) 





68 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


Mountains. By sinking a well fifty or sixty feet, con¬ 
nection is made with this stream, and water is procured. 
A windmill is set up over the well, the wind serving to 
pump the water into a storage-tank, usually just beside 
the well, but sometimes on the house itself; from this 
tank it flows as desired. 

RECLAIMING THE LAND 

It is not by wells and windmills, however, that the 
great Southwest is being reclaimed from the desert, but 
by irrigation on a large scale. The vast irrigation projects 
of the federal government have opened to settlement 
thousands of acres which had previously grown nothing 
but sagebrush, cactus, and mesquite. The great Ele¬ 
phant Butte Dam, previously mentioned in connection 
with El Paso, is an excellent example of the govern¬ 
ment’s reclamation work. 

This work was established under the Reclamation 
Law, passed by Congress in 1902. The law created a 
fund for the reclamation of arid lands, provided for the 
holding of public lands for actual settlers under the 
Homestead Act, and established the Reclamation Ser¬ 
vice in the United States Geological Survey, whose duty 
it was to investigate and report on irrigation projects. 

One of the first projects planned was the Roosevelt 
Dam and reservoir, constructed on the Salt River, 
Arizona. The work was begun in 1905 and completed 
by the year 1911. The site chosen was the place where 
Tonto Creek joins the Salt River and the great curved 
structure of the dam was built squarely across the 
canyon in which the river flows. The masonry extends 
280 feet above bedrock and measures 1,080 feet along 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


69 



the crest. The reservoir is really a great artificial lake 
more than 4 miles wide and 25 miles long, with ten 
times the capacity of the great reservoir which supplies 
New York City with water. It supplies enough water 
to irrigate 200,000 acres and has turned the Salt River 
valley into one of the richest and most productive 
farming districts in the West. Indeed, the $11,000,000 
which the Reclamation Service spent on the great dam 
has been repaid many times over by the great volume 


ROOSEVELT DAM 

of farm products and the increased value of the land. 

Besides irrigating arid lands, the Roosevelt Dam 
makes possible the development of water power for 
running electrical plants, which were constructed 
wherever falls were available. 

Another important project in this part of the South¬ 
west is the Laguna Dam at Yuma, Arizona, which, 



70 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


located on the lower Colorado River at a point where 
it forms the boundary between California and Arizona, 
provides irrigation facilities for these two states. This 
dam, with its canal, which the Reclamation Service 
began in 1905, was not completed until 1912. 

All these facts make us eager to see the Laguna Dam, 
which is on our route as we travel westward. 

A NEW MEXICAN TOWN 

Next morning we set forth to see the sights of 
Deming, which we find to be a kind of suburb to El 
Paso, just across the Texas border. It is a lively little 
city of about 4,000 people, in the Mimbres valley. 

The oldest inhabitant tells us that fifteen or eighteen 
years ago it was a typical New Mexican desert town, 
surrounded by a prairie of mesquite and sagebrush. 
At this period the houses were one- or two-story frame 
cottages, each with an adjoining garden that was a 
mass of sand, in which low, bare trees, great cacti, or 
a few arbor vitae were the only plants that throve. In 
each garden were a windmill and a tank. 

To-day, not only Deming but the entire valley is 
transformed. The soil is developed solely by pump 
irrigation, and the valley is supplied with water by 
300 pumping plants, each pumping from 200 to 2,000 
gallons a minute. As a result, the valley, is now given 
over to intensive farming and is noted throughout the 
Southwest for its apples and garden truck. 

Soon the train arrives, and we resume our journey 
westward. We pass barren plateaus known as mesas, 
desert tracts spotted with sagebrush, broad ranges 
where cattle are grazing, and fields of growing grain. 



THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 71 

Irrigated valleys alternate with stretches of wild land 
occupied only by arid buttes, dead volcanoes, and lava 
beds. From these striking contrasts, we realize, as 
never before, how rapidly this savage land is being 
tamed to man’s uses. 

THE FAMOUS MINES OF LORDSBURG 

Our ride is not really a long one, for we are bound 
for Lordsburg, the heart of a great mining country. 
Fifty-seven railway cars, holding 35,700 pounds of ore 
apiece, roll by as we pull into the station. 


OPENING A GOLD MINE IN THE DESERT 

We find Lordsburg a thriving little mining town of 
1,325 people, located in Grant County in the extreme 
southwestern corner of the state. This county and the 




72 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


neighboring counties are noted for their rich deposits 
of gold, copper, and zinc. 

We further learn that New Mexico is rich in minerals 
in other sections of the state. Coal, in all its forms, 
from lignite to anthracite, is abundant. The annual 
production of bituminous coal averages between 
2,000,000 and 4,000,000 tons. 

There are also large deposits of salt, clay, potash, 
marble, mica, iron, soda, ocher, tungsten, and gypsum, 
of which last product there seems to be an inexhaust¬ 
ible supply. We learn that turquoises are mined here 
as well as in the region around El Paso. Other 
precious stones found in New Mexico are garnets, 
opals, and chalcedony. 

So rich and important is the mining industry in New 
Mexico that the state has a School of Mines at Socorro. 

We want to see the famous New Mexican mines, and 
so engage a buggy. Our driver is a so-called “mine 
watcher,” his duty being to live in mines temporarily 
closed, while the owners go about securing more money 
to dig deeper, and to prevent the expensive machinery 
from being carried off, piece by piece, as it would be 
with no one to guard it. 

As we ride out into the desert, we learn much from 
the driver about the manner of life of the miners and 
prospectors. 

It appears that prospectors, as the hunters after 
mines are termed, when once they find indications that 
promise rich ore, will buy the claim; that is a stretch 
of land fifteen hundred feet in one direction by six 
hundred in the other. If the ore here promises to be 
rich, and is, say, copper, this will cost about a hundred 



THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 73 

dollars. Often more gold and lead than copper will be 
found in such a claim. 

Of course this staking of a claim is largely a matter 
of luck, the prospector judging of what lies deep in the 
earth by what is seen on the surface. The owner, for 
perhaps months before, has gone about alone or with an 


STAKING A CLAIM 

assistant, and with pick and shovel has struck at the 
ledges and dug down as far as he could by hand. Then, 
if he found, ore that seemed to pay, he set up a wind¬ 
lass, perhaps six feet tall, and taking nearly a whole 
day to get into operation. A rope and bucket were 
then attached to this, and the dirt windlassed out, 
until the prospector could descend into his “mine” a 




74 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


distance of perhaps fifty feet. During all this time 
he has been living quite a hermit’s life and subsist¬ 
ing on nothing better than beans, bacon, and coffee 
—the latter sweetened with a little sugar and the 
whole kept tied to one of the ponies’ sides. 

Probably the prospector soon realizes that his 
“strike” is no strike at all; so he gives up. On the 
other hand, he may still feel encouraged. If so, he 
then erects a steam or gasoline hoisting engine, and 
continues for say ten or a dozen feet beyond; and if 
then there is no ore, and the indications are not excep¬ 
tionally good, he will stop. 

If, however, ore is “struck,” the man proceeds to sell 
his claim to whoever he can induce to buy it. If the 
ore “runs” as much as twenty-five to thirty-five 
dollars a ton, he may get a thousand dollars for it. 

When such a claim is bought, the new owner brings 
out a gang of about ten men, regular miners or drillers, 
and “muckers,” or shovelers, who sink a shaft at the 
rate of from six inches to two feet a day. In this way 
it takes about thirty days to get a fair mine in running 
order, so that the ore can be taken out. 

Meantime we have been riding over the low pebble- 
strewn desert that goes to make up the “Foothills of 
New Mexico.” 

By and by we come to a number of adobe huts, with 
Mexican children playing about and Mexican women 
idle in the doorway. These are miners’ homes and 
indicate the presence of a mine. Beyond will be a long 
boarding-house for the officers of the concern and after 
that a rough shed over the hoisting machinery. 

If we have sufficient nerve, we will then step into 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


75 


what resembles nothing so much as a barrel-shaped 
kettle, at the end of a cable. The signal is given, and 
whizz! down we go a thousand, two thousand, three 
thousand feet, into night and cold, to where the miners 
are at work in the galleries, picking the ore from the 
rock, shoveling it into cars, and then loading into 
kettles such as we came down in, for hoisting to the 
surface, for mining is very primitive in its methods 
down here. 

From that mine we can go on to another and another 
and so on indefinitely. Here in the desert, mines are 
everywhere, and almost every sand-hill hides one from 
view. 

Where there are not mines, there will often stand, 
right in the sand, a little pile of boulders, marking the 
corner of some man’s claim. Again, at other places, 
one sees deep pits in the desert, that show where the 
prospector has given up in disgust. 

THE CACTI 

Another thing that interests us out here on the 
desert, is the endless variety of cacti. 

They are of every sort, from long spiny rods, that 
look like serpents with thorns in their sides, to great 
ball-shaped or oval plants, that blossom in gorgeous 
colors. The “dagger,” however, is, with the yucca 
plant, the most common of all. To these the prospec¬ 
tors and miners set fire, and cook their coffee over the 
blaze or warm their hands at it in the chill of early 
morning on the desert. 

We take down the different names of the cacti as 
given by our driver—the “corn-cob” and the “prickly 


76 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


pear,” the “oketare” (oh-ke'-tare) and the stingare 
(stin'-ga-ree) and goodness knows how many more. 

We could go on farther still into the desert, to,more 
mines and among more claims, but should only find a 
repetition of what we have seen. 



THE CACTI 


We therefore direct our guide to drive us back again 
to Lordsburg in season for the afternoon train. 

Our route now takes us through Stein's Pass, at . an 
altitude of forty-three hundred feet above the sea, and 
then down grade into Arizona. 

ARIZONA, THE INTERESTING 

Suddenly every eye in the car turns toward the win¬ 
dow and every neck is craned to obtain a glimpse of 





THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


77 


the Chiricahue (Kiri'-ka-hue) Mountain range that 
borders the track. Of course, like the rest, we waat to 
see Cachise (Ka-cheese'), the fierce Apache (Ah'-pach-e) 
chieftain, who lies along their tops. It is wonderful— 
this profile of a sleeping Indian brave, made by the 
contour of the peaks—it reminds us of the profiles in 
the White Mountains which we visited on our Little 
Journey to New England. 

The conductor calls “Bowie” (Boo'-e), and we 
know we are now in Arizona (Ah-ree-zon'-ah). 

Those of us who have seen the play by that name, 
expect to find the vaqueros and the soldiers, and the 
Indians everywhere. And the name of this stopping 
place certainly suggests bowie-knives and the like! 

From Bowie, we can make some interesting side- 
trips from the main trunk of railway. The first of 
these is to the Apache Reservation, where there 
are still hundreds of the braves and their squaws, 
living in a semi-civilized state. Some of the younger 
Apaches are model gentlemen, and as many of them 
possess a fair amount of money, they dress well, and, 
but for their very dark skins, might be taken for any 
other young men of refinement. On this reservation 
lived the famous Apache warrior, Geronimo, as a cap¬ 
tive of the Federal government, until his death in 1909. 
In the eighties of the nineteenth century, his bloody 
raids across southern Arizona and northern Mexico 
made his name terrible to white settlers throughout 
the West. 

We can also make a run up into the Gila (He'-la) 
Valley to Globe, where there are other famous copper 
mines. These trips we find worth while, as at each 


78 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


mine visited we learn some new feature of the work 
of extracting ore from the earth. 

A new feature of transportation is now attached to 
our train, one which we have not met on any of our 
former Little Journeys, but specimens of which 
are numerous out in the West and attract our notice. 
This is the tourist car, a cheap sort of sleeping car, 
adapted particularly to home-seekers, especially to those 



COMING FOR THE PAPERS, NEW MEXICO 


with little children, who go with their families out intc 
the West, as did the pioneers, to found new homes. For 
their benefit, at one end of the car there is a stove where 
meals may be prepared, and there is always hot water 
and the like, so that the home-seekers, who usually 





THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 79 

occupy one car for several days at a time, remind us a 
good deal of the second-cabin passengers on an ocean 

liner. 

SAND STORMS AND MIRAGES 

We -thought we knew the desert before, but here in 
Arizona we become acquainted with one more phase— 
the sand storms. Luckily, for us, we are not out in 
them, for the sand taken up by the wind and whirled 
over those plains stings as though each particular grain 
were a keen-edged knife-blade. It sifts through cloth¬ 
ing, shoes, everything—and there is little relief. 

Another peculiarity of the Arizona desert is the fre¬ 
quent mirages of lakes or pools, or groves of trees 
are refracted on the stretches of snow-white alkali, 
which, in the distance, turns to blue, and seem to make 
one tremendous lake. The bluish sheen is beautiful, but 
when we realize how tantalizing these illusions must 
have been to those for whom no water was at hand, we 
appreciate once more the fortitude it required to cross 
the desert in early days. 

We see an old-fashioned prairie schooner, a canvas- 
covered wagon drawn by mules, plodding slowly along 
on a trail parallel with the railway. Undoubtedly a 
trip of that kind is a hardship, but the people of to-day 
have this advantage over their predecessors—that they 
need not fear dying of thirst. Throughout the South¬ 
west, it is a law that whenever anyone runs short of 
water in any place, and really considers his life in 
danger, he has the right to flag a train of any sort and 
exact the beverage, at a fair price. An incident of this 


80 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


sort will occur to us later, while crossing the Mojave 
(Mo-ha-vay) Desert, we do but anticipate it here. 

Everyone is talking of the mines of this vicinity, and 
wherever there is a halt, we see the rough-looking, 
queerly clad miners. At Benson we stop for some 
time, while people leave for or get on from Guaymas 
(Gway-mus), in Lower California, where the recent min¬ 
ing troubles occurred. One hears of gold and silver 
and copper and lead, until it would seem there was 
nothing else in the world. 

We take our supper in the dining-car, and then ride 
on into the night. It is only half-past eight when 
Tucson is reached, but it is inky dark. That is the 
peculiarity of these starry southwestern nights. 

TUCSON 

We leave some of our baggage in the station at 
Tucson (Too-son'), safely checked, and start across the 
street to where lights are burning brightly. We go 
in search of a hotel and soon find a very handsome 
structure. Indeed Tucson is like the other south¬ 
western cities we have seen in this respect; it has some 
fine hotels with which to take care of the tourist trade. 

When we go for a walk along its streets, we find it 
amazingly metropolitan in appearance. Citizens whom 
we encounter inform us that it has a population of 
more than 20,000 people; and they talk proudly of its 
water and sewer systems, which were improved and 
enlarged in 1916 at a cost of $200,000. They call our 
attention to several handsome club buildings, the 
Y. M. C. A. headquarters, which was erected at a cost of 
$100,000, some admirable church buildings, theaters, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


81 


and business blocks—all substantial modern buildings. 
We learn that Tucson is governed on the city manager 
plan, adopted in 1915. 

It seems an excellent residence city. The streets are 
paved and in the best residential section are lined with 
bungalows that would do credit to cities like San 
Francisco and Los Angeles. In fact the citizens like 
to speak of Tucson as a city of beautiful homes. Very 
old inhabitants, who remember how it looked as the 
ancient Spanish town it was in 1853, when Arizona 
became a part of the United States under the Gadsden 
Purchase, say that they scarcely recognize it as the 
same town, so completely has every vestige of the old 
frontier civilization disappeared. 

In the business and industrial section, we observe 
concerns for manufacturing wagons, saddles, harness, 
and flour. As Tucson is the center of a grazing and 
mining region, however, the greater part of its wealth 
is derived from cattle-raising and copper mining. 

In our walk about the city we notice a minor source 
of revenue—the city’s excellent hospitals. For like 
San Antonio and El Paso, Tucson is a health resort of 
considerable reputation. Hither invalids suffering from 
tubercular, neurasthenic, anemic, rheumatic, and other 
disorders flock, seeking health from the mild Arizona 
climate. Here the heat is dry without being ener¬ 
vating, although the nights are cool enough to make 
blankets necessary; and sunstroke is unknown. We 
visit one or two of the leading hospitals and find them 
models of their kind. St. Mary’s has associated with 
it under the same management a sanitarium for the 


82 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


treatment of tuberculosis. On the outskirts of the city 
we see the magnificent big building of the Tucson 
Sanitarium, which specializes in diseases of the lungs 
and throat. 

Other points of interest which we take care not to 
miss during our visit to Tucson are the United States 
Magnetic Observatory; the public library, of which the 
city is very proud; the Desert Botanical Laboratory of 
the Carnegie Institution, where the flora of Arizona 
is studied by experts; and the University of Arizona, 
to which we devote a separate day of sight-seeing since 
it is on the outskirts of the city. 

At Tucson we shall find the rooms of the Arizona 
Pioneer Club especially interesting, not only on account 
of the numerous maps, and the photographs and cases 
of books they contain, but also because of the queer 
characters who constantly gather here to recount old 
times. 

As we enter, one of them is just telling a typical inci¬ 
dent. His name is Williams and he came to Tucson 
as a grocer in the sixties. Sugar then was six and a 
half cents the pound in New York, but it cost him 
twenty cents in addition to ship it out here, for it had 
to be taken by rail to Cheyenne (Shy'-n) and from 
there carried by prairie schooners. Furthermore, 
when he “ran out ” he had to wait sixteen months for 
a fresh supply. 

Then another man recalls the “Vigilance Committee,” 
as a certain general committee of citizens was called, 
which used to take the law into its own hands when the 
members thought the officials did not properly execute 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


83 


it. He tells how this committee went to the jail one 
night, took a murderer out, and hanged him to a tree, 
without a hand’s being raised to prevent it. 

We observe a peculiarity in the roofs of Tuscon. 
All of them, even those of the stores, project over the 
sidewalk, so as to give a shade when the sun is hottest. 
These, and the waterspouts of tin, about a foot in 
length, which likewise protrude most noticeably, are 
characteristics of Tucson houses. 

AN EDUCATIONAL CENTER 

We soon discover that Tucson is an important, if 
not the leading, educational center of the state. It was 
one of two towns where the first schools of Arizona were 
established—private institutions, whose pupils were 
largely Mexicans and Indians. The first public school 
of Tucson was opened in 1869, with an attendance 
of fifty-five—all Mexican boys. The school building 
was an adobe house with a dirt floor and pine benches 
for desks. The following year the attendance jumped 
to 138 and included a sprinkling of American boys. In 
1872, Tucson opened its first public school for girls. 

In view of these meager beginnings, we find the 
growth of its schools remarkable. Its primary, gram¬ 
mar, and high school buildings are handsome, well- 
equipped structures of brick or concrete, which would 
do credit to highly cultivated eastern communities; and 
the educational requirements of its teachers are of 
equally high standard. 

Naturally we are eager to see the highest institution 
of learning of a state so recently reclaimed from the 


84 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


frontier. Accordingly we take an electric car out to 
the University of Arizona. This institution, though 
created by the state legislature in 1885, was not 
formally opened until 1891. Since then, generous 
appropriations from the legislature have made possible 
a rapid development. The buildings are handsomely 
designed in the Moorish style of architecture, well 
suited to their quasi-tropical surroundings; yet they 
are thoroughly modern in equipment and arrangement. 

The activities of the university include much valu¬ 
able research work done at its agricultural experiment 
stations to develop farming, upon which the future 
welfare of Arizona so largely depends. We are told 
also that the experiment station of the United States 
Bureau of Mines is connected with the state bureau at 
the university, with which it collaborates in developing 
Arizona’s other great industry, mining. 

From the University we stroll over to the Indian 
school, a two-story frame building, to which our atten¬ 
tion is drawn by a number of Indian lads, felt hats 
upon their coal-black hair, hopping about on one foot 
at their play. These Indians are principally Papagos 
(Pap-pay'-goes) and Pemas (Pea-mahs), who are brought 
here by their parents when about seven years old, and 
are kept for eight full years. During this time half 
the day’s work consists of study, the other of industrial 
work. The girls are taught to cook plain food and 
make their own clothing; the boys learn irrigation, 
ranching, and, if they show any inclination for such a 
trade, carpentry. 

Now and then the parents visit the children, bringing 
then presents from the Reservation. Nevertheless, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


85 



the young Indians take to white men’s ways, and soon 
even most of their old games are forgotten. 

THE OLD SOUTHWEST 

Returning to the city by another route, we see some 
names that seem typical of the West as represented in 
the various illustrated journals. 

We see the signs of the Ramona Hotel, the Cactus 
Saloon, the Ostrich Restaurant, and such like, each 
more rough and wild than the other. A company of 


OLD-TIME PONY EXPRESS 




86 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


miners, bound for the Gould mines, have stopped in one 
of these, and their voices fill the air with riot. 

In the afternoon we will drive nine miles out into the 
back country to San Xavier (Savior) Mission, one of 
the finest of the old missions still extant. The site of 
this church was visited by Coronado (Kor-oh-nay'-do) 
as far back as 1539, when the country swarmed with 
Pimas and Papagoes and Coco-Maricopas (Ko-ko- 
Marry-ko'-paws). In 1732, Father Segasser (Say'- 
gos-sehr), a German priest, who was famous in the 
Southwest, took charge of the old church, and services 
have been held ever since to this day. In fact, origi¬ 
nally, Tucson was simply a sort of supply-ranch where 
cereals and stock were left to be forwarded to the 
mission, and where neophytes were quite generally 
recruited. 

At supper we will have as table companion a gentle¬ 
man bound for the famous Yaqui (Yah-kee) gold fields, 
in Mexico, where so many serious riots and so much 
bloodshed have occurred, and which are readily reached 
from this city. 

At twenty minutes to nine we again board the train 
for the next point of any interest, Yuma, which we 
reach at a quarter past six the next morning. 

THE HOTTEST PLACE IN THE COUNTRY 

Yuma has the distinction of being the hottest place 
in the United States. The temperature will often rise 
to a hundred and ten or twelve, and there is practically 
no shade to flee to. As, however, Yuma (You'-mah) 
contains too much of interest for us to pass it by, we 
resolve to brave the heat. 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


87 


As the train pulls in we see on all sides the Indians, 
the Yumas, in their gay garments, with blankets wound 


ON THE BRIDGE, YUMA 

round their heads and shoulders, despite the torrid 
climate. Straw hats and jeans mark the Yuma 












88 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


“bucks,” while the little pappooses go about with as 
little clothing as is at all permissible. 

Just across the Colorado (Kol-o-ray-do) River here 
at Yuma lies the Yuma Reservation, which we will 
find a most interesting place to visit. The Yumas 
live here in almost primitive state, building wicki¬ 
ups or cabins of a wattling of boughs and branches 
about four feet square. They extend a roof of these 
boughs out over the front of the cabin, to two slender 
poles, for supports. Under this extension, the women 
and children squat, lounging principally, but now and 
then bringing out the loom, and working on blankets 
or garments. At other times one sees them cooking in 
a great iron kettle over the fire, just as Indians were 
represented as doing in the books we read in child¬ 
hood. 

Of course there is a large Indian school at Yuma, 
where things are far more modern, but the Superin¬ 
tendent tells us that when the children leave the school 
and return to the wigwams, the elders scoff at the new 
ways they have learned, and soon cause them to return 
to the old life. 

Those who are interested in prisons and the treat¬ 
ment of prisoners will be interested in the prison 
here at Yuma It lies at the upper end of town, and 
is entered through the court-house, a low building 
with a central doorway leading into a sort of lobby. 
On the right is the courtroom furnished with a few 
plain chairs and a table, to the left offices open. In 
the rear is an enclosed courtyard, and opposite the 
entrance a great door of heavy iron bars which marks 
the gaol. Inside that door, as in the Turkish prisons, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


89 


all the prisoners are gathered, regardless of the offense 
they may have committed. 

We should like very much to board one of the steam¬ 
ers which run from here to the Gulf of California, 
by the way of the Colorado River, but this, we 
find on inquiry, the depth of water does not now 



INDIAN WIGWAM, YUMA 


permit. We then inquire, about going in the other 
direction, to the Laguna (La-goo'-nah) Dam, of which 
we have heard so much that we long to see it. This 
great waterway is copied after that of the Nile, and 
those of us caring at all for engineering can not afford 
to miss it. The river route is here, too, unavailable, 
so we shall go in a motor car. 






90 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


STAGING IT IN THE DESERT 

This gives us an opportunity to “stage” it once again 
in the desert, and to ride across a goodly portion of the 
Yuma Reservation. The corrals (kore-rells) for the 
horses on this latter, are built without roof (for it never 
rains here), the signs forbidding trading with the 
Indians, or selling them liquor of any sort, the occa¬ 
sional Indian boy, riding by on his pony, makes us fully 
realize that this is now the veritable “West.” Indian 
bucks are numerous, but as they braid their hair be- 



INDIAN GIRLS AT SCHOOL, YUMA 


hind, and as many of them wear blankets, we find it 
difficult to tell the men from the women as we approach 
from the rear. 

We find that this part of the Arizona desert is devoid 





THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


91 


ol cacti, and that it contains only the myrtle-like 
arrow weed which rises higher than the stage in perfect 
glades, giving shelter to countless coveys of quail. 
Great, thorny bushes, too, tear at the canvas sides of 
the stage as we dash across the desert. 

When we come to the great dam, we are surprised 
at its immensity, in spite of all we have heard about it. 
It is built of loose rock confined by three heavy, 
parallel concrete walls, and the top of it is covered 
with a layer of concrete 18 inches thick. It is con¬ 
structed across the river, and is 4,750 feet in length, 
244 feet wide, and 19 feet high. In spite of the fact 
that it was not intended to be a storage dam, it raises 
the water in the reservoir about 10 feet. 

The canal, built in connection with the dam, taps 
the river on the California side, about fourteen miles 
north of Yuma. We are told that it carries the water 
south to a point opposite the city, where it suddenly 
swerves downward in a kind of syphon under the 
Colorado River. Coming out again on the Arizona 
side, it continues southward into Mexico. 

It is estimated that the Laguna Dam and canal irri¬ 
gate about 130,000 acres, 52,000 of which are in the 
Yuma valley alone and 17,000 on the California side. 
The effect on the Yuma valley, indeed, is plain to be seen. 
Its fertile fields are a striking contrast to the cactus- 
covered desert regions we have passed through, which 
are as yet untouched by the magic hand of irrigation. 

What little time we have on our return to Yuma, we 
spend in sauntering over to the old town prison, a 
queer-looking structure on the heights, which seems to 
be all walls and no windows, but which, likewise, en¬ 
closes a court. We also visit the Indian reservation. 


92 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


On this latter, however, we shall have to beware of the 
“quick-sand,” a chocolate-colored mud that seems 
very dry until we step on it, when it will engulf us in 
very short order. 

We retire early for we are to leave at quarter to four 
in the morning. Our next stopping place was to 



INDIAN HOME NEAR YUMA 


have been Salton (Saul-tun), where salt was once 
taken from the desert. The Colorado River, however, 
saw fit to change its course, about six months before 
our Little Journey was begun, wiping out the town 
and leaving the railway to rebuild its track twice, 
thrice, and even a fourth time—moving before the 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


93 


vast, ever encroaching water; consequently there is 
now no Salt on to visit. 

Instead, we determine on a side trip into the Imperial 
Valley. We have an enjoyable ride through the great 
sand deserts, whose whiteness reminds us of the shore 
of New Jersey, and again over veritable waves of brown 
sand, where the great sand-storms wage merry warfare. 
We note that as the winds are all from the south, and 
as there is no sod to stay its progress, the sand is shifted 
constantly on and on, in one invariable direction, to 
the utter destruction of all vegetation or of any other 
objects in its path. 

On the north the Chocolate Mountains rise, with 
their wealth of gold and silver, and we are interested 
in watching the dawn on thier peaks. 

Then the brakeman calls “Old Beach/’ and we dis¬ 
embark. 


BELOW SEA-LEVEL ON THE SEASHORE 

We are here just two hundred and forty-nine feet 
below the level of the sea, at a distance of 1,822 miles 
from New Orleans. We stand here on the old beach 
of the ocean—that is to say, the beach that was in pre¬ 
historic times. 

We take a side spur of the railway here to visit some 
interesting towns. First of all, however, we shall have 
breakfast in a Mexican shack that serves as station. 
Only ham and eggs are procurable, and for these they 
charge us half a dollar. 

By and by our train, composed half of freight 
and half of passenger cars, comes along, bound for 
Imperial. 


94 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


THE STORY OF WATER 

Aboard once again, every one is talking irrigation. 
We never, heard so much about it in our lives before. 
We learn that in 1892 the vast scheme of irrigation 
and reclamation of the Imperial Valley was begun, and 
in 1900 the vast work that has converted the desert into 
a garden, was actually started. 

The Colorado River, at a point eight miles beyond 
Yuma was made to yield the main supply of water to 



FALLS IN IRRIGATION CANALS 


a great system of canals, which were built to reach every¬ 
where into the desert, so that as much as ten thousand 
cubic feet of water could, be taken from the stream 
every second. In fact, a head-gate was constructed 







THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 95 

capable of carrying fifteen thousand cubic feet of 
water. 

The water that could be diverted, however, varied 
with the seasons. That was why the Colorado River 
was so particularly valuable. You got the greatest 
amount of water just when you needed it most, i. e., in 
the summer season. In this respect the stream is un¬ 
like any other in the Southwest. 

To husband and distribute the water, a main canal 
two hundred feet wide at the mouth was built and from 
it others and others, and still others! To give all the 
statistics they tell us would be tiresome. Suffice it to 
say that thousands of miles of canal have been dug 
and millions of acres of land have been made fertile 
by irrigation. 

Before the water came, furthermore, land was sold at 
a dollar and a quarter the acre—when you could find a 
buyer. Today the crop value alone, especially on lands 
irrigated by the government projects, is between $125 
and $135 an acre, according to the government reports. 

And, crops! Why it seems as though they could 
raise everything out here! Not one only—but two, 
three, four, six, yes even seven crops—notably of 
alfalfa—a year! All in what was once an arid desert. 

On our ride over the irrigated region, we shall be 
interested in watching the spouting of the mud- 
volcanoes, in the distance, which remind us of those in 
Iceland. We will be even more interested in seeing how 
the desert has changed into a garden. Meantime, how¬ 
ever, we feel a certain dryness on our lips, and moisten 
them with the tongue. In a few moments they are 
drier still, and ever drier. Drawing out a pocket-glass 


96 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


we find them almost black, and ready to crack. We 
are alarmed until a companion assures us that this is 
simply the effect of the alkali in the air, and occurs to 
all “tenderfeet” in the desert. 

At eleven o’clock we leave the train at Calexico 
(Kal-ex'-e-ko). The name sounds queer and we 
analyze it. Cal—exico. The one from “California” 
the other from “Mexico.” Shortly afterward, we come 
to Mexicali (Mex'-e-kahl-e), where the syllables are 
just reversed. It reminds us of Kenova (Ken-oh'-vah), 
at the junction of Kentucky, Ohio and Virginia. 

ON THE FRONTIER 

Calexico and Mexicali, though founded as separate 
towns a short distance apart, have grown into each 
other, forming a dual town of about 20,000 people. It 
is located on the boundary line, Mexicali being the 
Mexican end and Calexico, the American end. In the 
latter place, we pass the United States custom house; 
and we arc told that this little frontier city is the gate¬ 
way through which pour millions of dollars worth of 
imports annually from Mexico to the United States 
($12,500,000 in 1919) and a large volume of exports, 
mainly foodstuffs, from our country into Mexico. 

We can secure a motor car here to take us over the 
great system of canals and ditches of this famous dis¬ 
trict. 

Just where we leave the city behind, there is a little 
park, with date palms flourishing nicely, and an Indian 
leaning over the rail. This scene recalls to us the early 
frontier days, and the stories of Ellis and Lounsberry. 
To heighten the association, there is the long row of 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


97 



stores of the “Mexicali Commercial Co.,” that recall the 
establishments of the great Dutch East India Company, 
and the Hudson Bay Company, and like enterprises 


OLD-STYLE TRANSPORTATION IN NEW MEXICO 

that helped to colonize the eastern coast of the conti¬ 
nent almost four centuries ago. 

At the same time, however, the presence on every 
side of restaurants where ice-cream soda is served, of 
barber poles, pool tables and modern awnings indicates 
that times have changed. 

By and by we are out in the green harvested meadows 
of what was but recently a desert. Canals, lined with 
correls, ’dobe houses, and the like are everywhere. 
In 1901, when the first yard of dirt was dug, there 
was not a drop of water here, and supplies had to 




98 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


be carried to the workmen from the main branch of the 
railway. In fact, when the little town was founded, in 
1901, freight teams, much like the “schooner” we shall 
see at Sacramento, had to carry supplies forty-one 
miles. 

We have heard long ago of the immensity of enter¬ 
prises out west. In Texas we thought we realized this. 
Here, however, we find ourselves still more amazed. 
One company, for instance, has ten thousand acres of 
land on one side the road, fifty thousand on the other, 
and five hundred thousand acres below, awaiting 
irrigation. Already nine thousand head of cattle are in 
a five thousand acre range here, and as much land again 
is under cultivation, planted with corn to fatten these 
animals. Think of it—nine thousand black and brown 
cattle in a single field! That is the great Southwest. 

We are interested again in the sluggish ditches that 
are responsible for this growth. We learn that it will 
require a team and the labor of the men accompanying 
it for fifty days to build a ten-foot ditch a mile long, 
and the cost is about three hundred dollars. 

Real Indians are employed at the work, and they 
seem to take to it very nicely. 

Another thing that catches our eye as we ride along 
is the number of muskrat holes in the banks. A single 
muskrat can do thousands of dollars worth of damage 
by boring into the dikes, and letting the water through, 
to overflow the country side. So there are standing 
rewards to the boys of the Imperial Valley to catch 
muskrats and bring in their bodies for bounties. 

If we drive on until evening, we shall hear a peculiar 
drumming. There are no frogs in this ditch country, 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


99 



but a toad living in the water is ubiquitous, and he keeps 
up his music in the more sluggish bayous. 

At twilight, especially, the scene recalls old Indian 
days. For miles there will be no trace of Man or man's 
habitation visible, except maybe just on the horizon, 
where an Indian wick-i-up, stands clear cut against the 
sky. We, however, will have exhausted this section 
before sunset; in fact we must be back at Calexico by 
half-past two, in season for the train. 

We also wish to see the town of Imperial, located in 
the famous Imperial Valley, whose history reads like a 


RAISING DATES 

fairy tale. In 1903 it was a sandy desert. Then irri¬ 
gation came, and in 1905 when the Colorado River 
burst its dykes f which controlled the water supply of 




100 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


the valley, the new river, flowing unchecked, turned the 
Imperial Valley into a garden spot. There are now 
500,000 acres of the valley under cultivation. We are 
informed that Imperial Valley farmers raise four crops of 
alfalfa a year; and we know the valley is famous for its 
superior brand of cantaloupe, tomatoes, and other fruits. 

We find Imperial a thriving little town of almost 
1,900 people, with wide, paved streets, electric lights, 
and all other marks of a strictly modern community. 

At the same time, out in the street two cowboys, 
with great leather stirrups and spurs, and coiled rope 
at their saddles, are “ dancing” their horses as cowboys 
always do in the stories. 

In the evening, at the hotel, we are agreeably sur¬ 
prised at the supper, and after that at the quiet pre¬ 
vailing in town. Some of the men gather at the hotel 
to play cards, but in a quiet, gentlemanly manner. 

THE LAND OF THE YOUNG MEN 

The next day we will visit some of the famous 
ranches of the Imperial Valley, this because of a pecu¬ 
liar interest they have for us, as they may be said to 
embody “young man’s land.” 

Dozens of young college students from all over the 
country have come out to the Imperial Valley, have 
taken up ranches and are making a great success. 
This is the case, not alone in ordinary, but experi¬ 
mental ranching. One of them, for example, has 
taken to raising Angora goats, and already hundreds 
of the little kids are out in the green, rolling meadows. 
Others are trying rotation of crops—i.e., making the 
same field produce numerous crops of different sorts 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


101 



in a single year, one crop exhausts one set of chemicals 
in the soil, and another another. 

We shall be happy to accept the invitation of some 
of these young collegians, to take dinner with them in 
their bungalows on the ranches. Possibly, if we are 
over particular, the dishes might be washed a little 


RANCH HOUSE, IMPERIAL VALLEY 

cleaner, and we do not altogether relish taking milk 
with a dipper from the pail, and all that—but otherwise 
we enjoy the outing very much. 

What we admire most of all is their enthusiasm— 
and that we shall now note as long as we are in Cali¬ 
fornia. There is only one other state in the Union 
where the people are such absolute state patriots, and 
so constantly singing the praises of their home, and that 






102 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


is Kentucky. Out here in California they do not dis¬ 
cuss the wrongs of government, and the news of the day, 
and such things, but only and always “wonderful 
California.” 

Then, too, the enthusiasm of these young men for their 
work is remarkable. Some of them have been “ ne’er- 
do-wells, rich men’s sons who, not feeling the necessity 



ANGORA RANCH 


of work, had gone wrong. The wealthy “papa” cut 
off their supplies and they came out here, and laying 
aside all their knowledge of algebra, quotations of San¬ 
skrit, philosophy and the like, they are carving success 
from the desert. 

Nor do they let all work and no play make of them 





THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


103 


“dull boys.” Baseball is played on the valley turn¬ 
pikes, sixty-seven feet below the sea level. There are 
racing matches and athletic contests, but what they 
delight in most is to come together on one of the irriga¬ 
tion canals with their mandolins, and play “Fair 
Harvard,” or “Hail Stanford,” or “Here’s to Good Old 
Yale.” Those of us who have made the Little 
Journey to New England will recall how the students 
at Harvard delight in doing much the same on the 
Charles. 

In the course of our drive among the ranches, we will 
find that we shall be now in Mexico, now in the United 
States, now in Mexico again, for the border runs through 
the valley and we are careless which side of it we may 
be on. On the American side, however, we shall want to 
stop for a snap-shot of a grove of African date-palms 
planted out here and under the care of a government 
expert, they are now growing with marked success. 
The younger palms are kept wrapped about with heavy 
paper, but the older ones spread their graceful fans, 
and in a short time dates will be sent out from Cali¬ 
fornia. 

to death valley for health 

At half-past three in the morning, we are awakened 
by our host at Imperial to catch the train for the 
Junction, where the main road continues on to the 
coast. 

This ride will take us through a deep depression, the 
bed of an ancient sea, with sulphurous mud and hot 
water springs, to Salton, where we are 263 feet below 
the level of the sea. At Salton, until the year 1905 


104 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


there flourished the not inconsiderable salt industry 
before mentioned. Then in connection with the build¬ 
ing of the canals we just visited, there was dug a channel 
to divert the waters of the Colorado River. The people 
digging this canal had reckoned on the usual dry 
summer in which to do the work. Instead, however, 
and for the first time in recorded history, there came a 



AT LAGUNA DAM, ON THE COLORADO 


flood at a most unexpected season. The banks were 
washed down, the waters rose high, and the entire 
Salton Valley was flooded. 

Nothing could stop those waters. Had there been a 
town here, the loss of life would have been a repetition 
of the famous Conemaugh (Kon-a-maw) Valley dis- 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


105 


aster. As it was, the salt-beds were wiped out and 
the villagers fled. 

Still the waters rose, until they spread into a lake. 
The railway tracks had to be moved mile after mile, 
not once, but many times. For some time the tele¬ 
graph poles were partly submerged. At one time 
during the flood, it was estimated that 2,000 square 
miles were under water. By 1906, this temporary lake 
had an area of 675 square miles; for because of the 
great heat of the Salton Valley, the amount of evapora¬ 
tion was about equal to the inflow from the Colorado 
River. 

We have already learned how the Imperial Valley, 
which is a safe distance south of Salton, profited by 
this overflow. But the Salton Valley itself suffered 
heavily in loss of property and natural resources. 
Naturally every effort was made to turn the Colorado 
River back into its original channel and stop the flood. 
After several unsuccessful attempts, the overflow was 
checked in 1907, when the Southern Pacific Railroad 
constructed three parallel trestles across the break and 
from these trestles had huge stones dumped into the 
lake, forming an effective breakwater. 

Thenceforward the lake gradually diminished in size, 
and when last measured, its area was reported to be 
443 square miles. It continues to shrink from year 
to year. 

PALMS IN THE DESERT 

From twenty-five minutes past six until ten minutes 
to nine, we follow the shore of the Salton Sea, 
with nothing more exciting to interest us than 


106 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


drift, and now and then, a gang of Mexicans at work 
endeavoring to stem, if possible, the course of the 
waters. After the lake is passed the desert becomes 
absolutely white with the alkali, and again as flat as 
the proverbial pancake. 

Then, of a sudden, the brakeman calls “Indio” 
(In'-dee-oh), the train stops and we are amazed to find 
ourselves in a grove of luxuriant palm trees. Whence 
these came, and when, is an unsolved mystery of the 



TENTS AT INDIO 

desert. That they are a welcome sight, especially to 
those who have come across the deserts without the 
excursion into the Imperial Valley, and have, therefore, 
seen nothing green until now, goes without saying. 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


107 


We shall make a stop at Indio in order to see the 
result of a rather unique experiment that is known as 
going to “Death Valley for health.” Aside from the 
palms, Indio lies in a desert that is much like Death 
Valley. The air, however, is particularly dry, and so 
out on the sand of the wastes there has been opened a 
city of tents, for sufferers from consumption only. These 
poor people, both men and women, are many of them 
in either the last stages of the dread disease, or else in a 
condition which renders it possible to live only if they 
remain here; they would die almost at once if removed 
to other altitudes. 

The hardest part of the life at Indio, is the lack of 
amusement. The invalids come to see the train pull 
in, and then, perhaps, to get their mail. Indio, how¬ 
ever, is a very small place and there is not much other 
distraction. Consequently time hangs heavy and even 
long walks cannot be indulged in, for on the desert, 
these are not at all pleasant. Some of the men go 
hunting, for quail, ducks, or rabbits, but the supply of 
game is likewise rather limited. 

It will not take us long to see this camp, as it is 
called. The tents are about thirty in number and each 
is a counterpart of the rest. They have a wooden 
floor, a double iron bed, an iron cot, and usually a 
table with a little oil-cloth cover, on which repose a 
lamp, letters, papers and the like, while beneath are 
some soap-boxes into which other articles are stowed. 

The one lesson, more than any other, that we carry 
away from the place is to appreciate our health, and 
the liberty it gives us. To be condemned to spend the 
remainder of our lives in a spot such as this, to know 


108 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


that to leave it is to surely bring death upon ourselves, 
were terrible indeed. 

ONWARD INTO REAL CALIFORNIA 

From Indio, the route lies on, at last, into the real Cali¬ 
fornia, namely, that section of the “Golden State” 
which we always think of on hearing California 
mentioned. 

This is, of course, the “sunshine land,” the “land of 
palms and flowers and fruits,” of tourists and good 
hotels and splendid drives, and a thousand other at¬ 
tractions. 

As we enter it, we will bid adieu to the real Southwest. 
Not, however, without a parting souvenir, for upon our 
lips a boil is rapidly growing, caused by the alkali in the 
air of the desert. 

On that last ride through the desert, we learn of the 
region traversed. We did not realize it, but we have 
been taking a dive below the sea level without getting 
wet, for out here near Indio, we are as much as twenty 
feet below the surface of the ocean. 

The lack of humidity in this locality, too, is remark¬ 
able. If we take a hundred per cent to mean air sat¬ 
urated until it will hold no more water, and zero to 
represent air that is absolutely without moisture, we 
will find that the great general average is eighty percent 
in the Northern Atlantic States. Fifteen percent is 
rare, and ten percent is rarer, even in arid Arabia, 
but out here at Indio, they get down as low often as 
nine percent. In fact, it is stated that there is a rain¬ 
fall here of but three inches a year. 

This will make the transformation, change and con- 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 109 

trast as we enter the “real” California, all the more 
wonderful to us. 

We note the “lenticulating” of the surface of the 
desert into oblong mounds, raised above the general 
level from two inches to two or even three feet, the 
spaces between the swells being known locally as “hog 
wallows.” For a long time they were thought to have 
been made by the burrowing of ground squirrels; they 
are in reality the work of the wind, blowing steadily in 
one direction against the movable sands. 

Already at Beaumont (Bow'-mont) we strike the 
fruit-belt, and men are down at the station selling 
oranges at a dime a basket. Everyone buys, so that 
when, shortly after, the newsboy comes through the cars 
with his oranges at a nickel apiece, he is literally hooted. 

Everything is green here, now, and the verdure is 
grateful to eyes that have so long been accustomed to 
desert and sand. We note some little canons opening 
off to right and left of the track, and in them hundreds 
of beehives. This is the beginning of the apiary 
country of California, and an apiarist in the seat at our 
side talks entertainingly of bee-culture. As we shall 
visit the larger apiaries later on in this Little J ourney, 
however, we will postpone his discourse until such time. 

It is just noon when our two locomotives bear us 
through the great orange groves into the station at 
Colton (Coal'-tun). Here there will be really nothing 
for us to see, but we dismount, as this is the junction 
where we change cars for Riverside (as spelled), of which 
we have heard so much. If we wish to be good to our 
pocket-books, we may later find it wise to take lodging 
at Colton, and run back and forth to Riverside at will. 


110 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


Between trains, we may stroll through Colton with 
profit. The little stores, each with its bicycle rack at 
the curb (for the wheel is everywhere in use) are rather 
interesting. Barbers here, we note, as in New Orleans, 
insist on leaving a boiling wet rag on the face of the 
newly shaven, while they prepare the lather and strop 
their razors. Lunch-wagons, too, we note as being par¬ 
ticularly numerous. Although it is now but the 26th 
of January, the heat is making itself felt and before 
long we have doffed our winter clothing, which we had 
donned on quitting the desert, and wear instead the 
thinnest suits that we can obtain. 

THE LAND OF ORANGES 

Once aboard the little “ spur-railway ” train, we are 
in the land of oranges. The great groves stretch off on 
every hand, the golden fruit peeping out from beneath 
the glossy leaves. The trees are laden with blossoms, 
green fruit and ripe fruit—all at the same time. Irri¬ 
gation canals extend along the groves, and run back in 
among them, increasing the general beauty of the 
prospect. In fact, what with the deep leaf shadows 
and the juicy pendant balls ready for plucking from the 
cars, we would be glad to continue this ride indefinitely. 
The speed, however, here is something terrific, and 
before we would suspect, we are at the world-famous 
Riverside 


RIVERSIDE, THE BEAUTIFUL 

From our first peep at Riverside, we shall be charmed 
with the place. Along the main thoroughfare, are 
handsome, though small, shops where articles to attract 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


111 


tourists are sold and here great palms have been set at 
the curb, and often at the inner edge of the sidewalk 
also. The hotels are in the mission style, and many of 
them have tempting shops on their lower floors, among 
which we can loiter. We shall want to buy for fifteen 
cents, a tiny crate of imitation oranges ready to mail 



ORANGE PICKERS CALIFORNIA 


home to our friends. If we are thirsty, lemons, too, 
newly picked, at a dime a dozen, will tempt us. Every¬ 
where notices in regard to lemons and oranges are 
tacked about, for here is the headquarters of the famous 
Citrus Union, regulating the sale of these fruits almost 
all over the world. Real estate agents, too, know the 
value of the orange, and frequently place an orange twig 




112 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


in their windows as a sign that they have orange groves 
for sale. 

We linger a moment before a shoe store in which a 
graphophone is kept playing all day to attract cus¬ 
tomers; and then board one of the electric cars. The 



ENTRANCE TO ESTATE, RIVERSIDE 


rear and front of this car are open, the center closed, 
and it is thus adapted to any kind of weather. A bevy 
of school children, hatless, and the girls in dainty white 
frocks, are aboard, just out from school, and they make 
the ride merry with their pranks. 

Everywhere the palms and other foliage are so dense 
that one can scarce see the magnificent villas that lie 
behind. Many of these estates are fringed with rows 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


113 


of the graceful, lacy pepper-trees, which add so much 
to the beauty of a California landscape. Others 
stand in a square of open lawn inclosed on three 
sides by groves of orange trees. Where these dense, 
shaded groves have the irrigation canals at their 
borders, and, perhaps, a pepper tree or two at inter¬ 
vals, we are reminded of the villas of the Dutch 
aristocracy. 

By and by we turn into the famous Riverside Boule¬ 
vard. Trees and oranges alone seem everywhere, and 
in looking down the side avenues, it would seem that 
we were simply glancing into arbors that lead to the 
bleak, bare, and yet beautiful mountains in the dim 
distance. Down the center of this road, Magnolia Ave¬ 
nue, there extends a long avenue of the pepper trees, 
each tree set far apart from the rest, in a broad stretch 
of sod. In this same grass plot, too, telegraph and 
electric light poles stand. On the right and left of the 
grass runs the road, bordered by fan-palms or mag¬ 
nolias. In their shadow is the walk, and still beyond 
is a row of arbor vitae, behind which are the homes, 
the churches, and the inevitable orange groves. Here 
and there, of course, there are variations. At one place 
the century plant and the fan palm alternate, one with 
the other, beside the road. At another there is a 
magnificent avenue of palms, leading up to the house, 
and down this avenue a company of ladies ride on 
horseback. 

At the end of the line there is a small ostrich farm, 
which we will omit, as we shall visit the larger one at 
Pasadena. There is also a deer lodge with a famous 
herd of black-tailed Oregon deer. Just across from 


114 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


these the Sherman Indian School, the property of the 
Government, is located. 

A HANDSOME INDIAN SCHOOL 

A little twelve-year-old Mission Indian boy, named 
Robert, will be our guide through this institution. 
Robert takes us first through the largest building, 
known at the “Tepee,” and then through the remaining 



SHERMAN INDIAN SCHOOL 


structures. In all of these we will find Indian boys 
and girls, representatives of not less than thirty-two 
tribes, brought in from Arizona, New Mexico, Cali¬ 
fornia and as far north as the State of Washington. 

At the Indian School the children study during one- 




THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


115 


half of the day, and are instructed in manual training 
during the other—the boys learning to be farmers, the 
girls to do housework, sewing, and other feminine work. 

In addition, characteristic Indian souvenirs, bead- 
work and the like are made to be sold to tourists. 

As we leave the school we hear the bugles call, and 
hundreds of children file out—there are about five 
hundred pupils in all—for the nightly ceremony of 
saluting the colors. 

We have still a little time before evening sets in, and 
so drop into a neighboring park for a rest. Here we 
find two old horse cars put to unique uses—one has 
been made into a deer-house, the other into a roomy 
pigeon-cote. 


RAISING THE ORANGES 

Before leaving Riverside, we shall want to visit the 
famous orange groves, to learn something about orange 
culture. 

The orange trees, we are told, are set out about 
twenty feet apart in every direction. If raised from 
the seed, the trees are “budded” the second year. 
This budding is a peculiar process which produces the 
now famous “navel or seedless orange.” Right under 
the top of the leaf-stem on the orange trees, there is a 
little growth or bud, which would become a small 
branch if let alone. Instead, however, the orange 
raisers cut a slit of sufficient size in the main shoot, 
loosen the bark, and then slip this bud therein, tie it 
with wax cord, and leave it to grow. 

When once this has partly grown out from the main 
shoot, that main stalk, part of which is above it, is cut 


116 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


off, and the little slit and bud becomes the main tree. 
In about three or four years the tree begins to bear 
fruit, and at the age of fifteen or eighteen years is at 
its maturity. 

Seedling oranges mature at later periods, so that 
when the navels are out of the market these come in. 
Consequently many growers here have trees of both 
sorts. 

A good orange tree at Riverside will yield from three 
to ten boxes a year, which will sell at anywhere from 
seventy-five cents to two dollars a box, according to 
the time of year and grade of fruit. 

Aside from irrigation and cultivating the ground 
among the trees—which latter is often effected by 
planting peas among them, so as to loosen the soil and 
create a humus—orange culture does not require a 
vast amount of labor and hence is indulged in by many 
well-to-do persons, who might not care for other more 
laborious forms of horticulture or farming. 

If we drive out among the groves we will see, here 
and there, boys picking oranges. For this work they 
wear a canvas bag about a foot and a half long, held to 
the belt by a wire at each side. When the bag is full, 
the boy simply opens a clamp, and the oranges 
dump themselves into boxes, holding perhaps eighty 
oranges apiece. The gathering is very simple; they 
do not break them from the trees, but snip each orange 
from the stem with a nipper, and then snip the stem to 
the very end. Otherwise, if a short stem is allowed to 
remain on the orange in the box, it may prick some 
other orange and spoil it. 

From the pickers the oranges are taken by wagon to 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


117 


the packing-house where the fruit is rolled into long 
chutes, similar to those in a long bowling alley. In the 
bottom of these chutes are holes of various sizes. 
Through the smallest of these fall, first, naturally, the 
smaller oranges, as they roll past; then the next size into 
the next, and so on—thus separating themselves into 
the bins beneath. All that remains to be done is for 
girls to wrap the finer qualities about with tissue paper, 
and to box them for railway shipment. 

THE FIRST NAVEL ORANGE 

Returning to the heart of Riverside, in the grounds 
of one of the hotels we will see the parent tree of this 
vast navel orange industry. This tree, and another, 
were brought by the government from Bahia (Bah-he-a) 
Brazil, in 1874, and from them, by the process of budding 
all the navel oranges of California have sprung. No 
tree, in fact, since the famous miracle-tree of “Yygg- 
drasil,” in the Scandinavian myth, has ever yielded 
as prolifically. 


A UNIQUE HOTEL YARD 

In this same hotel yard, there will be other things 
to attract our attention. A bit of wall, built*as were 
the walls of the old Spanish Missions, and containing a 
series of heavy bells that chime the hours for meals; 
and a deep old well with a boulder “well-top.” Queer 
flower-pots of cement, on the roof, and a weather-vane 
in the form of a quaint little monk, are among the most 
valuable of these. The lobby, too, will delight us, for 
in addition to being equipped with the heavy mission 
furniture, there is a shelf running along the wall, at 


118 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


about half its height, on which all manner of Indian 
pottery is exhibited. If we take our lunch in this hotel, 
we will find quite a difference from the big hotels of the 
east, which difference we shall observe throughout Cali¬ 
fornia, and that is that they have waitresses only. Here 
at Riverside, too, orangeade is served instead of water, 
at-meals. 


THE FAMOUS SMILEY HEIGHTS 

Returning to Colton, we proceed on to Redlands 
that we may visit the famous Smiley (Smile'-ee) 
Heights. The distance is not great—we have hardly 
noted the fertile valley, with its pepper trees and its 
orange groves, lying between the barren, snow-covered 
mountains, before Redlands is reached. 

Arrived here, we engage a motor car for a drive about 
the city. The place itself reminds us a good deal of 
Manchester-by-the-Sea or Magnolia,visited on our other 
Little Journey —it is a small town that is supported 
by the rich estates lying all about it. Everywhere 
there are neat little homes; palms are set between the 
street and the sunny walk, some low, others very tall; 
these add greatly to the general beauty. What strikes 
us as odd, in connection with the cottages, is that the 
gardens are devoid of sod, but are densely planted with 
orange and pepper trees. 

Our chauffeur speaks enthusiastically of this region. 
He says that from the 12,000 acres of orange groves 
that surround Redlands there are shipped annually 
more than 5,000 cars of oranges—a record shipment. 
Then, having pointed out to us Mt. San Bernardino 
(Bur-nar-dee'-no), rising up 11,800 feet, he proceeds to 



THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 119 

tell us of Smiley Heights, toward which we are climbing 
*—the park being at an elevation of about sixteen 
hundred feet above the level of the sea. The Smileys, 
it seems, are two brothers who have their homes in this 
vast estate, which they have beautified and then very 
kindly opened to the public for a park. Everywhere 


MIRROR LAKE, SMILEY HEIGHTS 

there is the densest shnibbery for background; the 
most beautiful flowers, laurels, roses, and violets, for 
foreground. Between these, little rustic summer 
houses are set, where one may rest and catch bird’s- 
eye views between the foliage, of the groves in the 
distant valley. Denser and denser does the wild wood 
become, as one ascends. Then, as suddenly, we come 



120 


A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 


out on Mirror Lake, a pretty little pool, bordered with 
plants and flowers, in which is mirrored with great 
clearness, whatever may be at its edge. 

Descending from the Heights, after perhaps an hour 
among its sylvan lanes, we shall want to see more of the 
magnificent homes of Redlands. That of Mr. Burrage, 
of Standard Oil fame, will particularly attract us, while 
Highland Avenue, with its palms on either side and its 
palatial homes beyond, again somewhat recalls Mag¬ 
nolia. We learn that the owners of some of these 
places, wearying of their monotony, often rent them 
for three months at a time, at a set rental of six hundred 
dollars a month. 

We make our drive include Prospect Park, another 
private park open to visitors, and noted for its jasmin 
and roses, which bloom here in April and in May. 
Then we return to the heart of the city. 

ON TO SAN BERNARDINO 

Everyone who has visited Redlands and Riverside 
takes in San Bernardino, and so, therefore, do we. We 
board an electric car, so labeled, and are carried 
country-ward. Aside, however, from curious pipes, 
standing erect from the soil, at intervals, for irrigation 
purposes, and an apiary, there is little to interest us on 
the ride. In fact, the scenery is not at all unlike that 
of southern Ohio. 

We find San Bernardino a beautiful residence city, 
surrounded by orange groves. Though it has not the 
magnificence and wealth of Redlands and Riverside, it 
is considerably larger than Redlands and only a thou¬ 
sand or so behind Riverside in population, having more 


THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


121 


than 18,500 people. It is a railway center, connected ' 
by electric railway to Arrowhead Hot Springs, a near¬ 
by health resort, famous for its medicinal baths. The 
city attracts many summer resort tourists. 

TO LOS ANGELES 

Very early next morning we leave once more by 
railway for Los Angeles, the terminus of what is so 
often called “tourist California.” Great fields of 
canaigre (kan'-ager), a plant resembling beet tops or 
dock, and extensively employed in tanning, makes 
interesting a rather barren region, after we have passed 
Bloomington. Then with the barren mountains ever 
for our background, we enter a famous farming country, 
centering around Ontario, and threaded with lanes lined 
by the pepper trees. On the north the San Gabriel 
Mountains now loom, while in the foreground stretch 
orange groves and vineyards, some of them three 
thousand acres in extent. Cars of the Citrus Union 
rattle past until, by the time we have reached Pomona 
(Po-mo'-nah), the sight of the fig and walnut and 
almond orchards is a welcome relief, after the monotony 
of those endless orange and lemon plantations. 

We cross a long bridge over a dry river bed, only to 
see once again, the results of irrigation, for this bed was 
once the San Gabriel River, now dry and waterless. 
Then, when we stop at Lordsburg, some women enter 
the car, each in low, black bonnets, covered with jet, 
and accompanied by their husbands, all of whom wear 
soft, dark hats. These are the Bunkers, who have 
colonized hereabouts, and, like the Mormons in Utah, 
caused the land to blossom. 


122 A LITTLE JOURNEY THROUGH 

If we were in season for a foot-washing service, we 
should certainly stop off at Lordsburg to visit the 
Dunkers (Dun'-kers). This ceremony occurs once a 
year, and as those of us who may have witnessed it on 
our Little Journey through the Alleghanies may 
recall, is preceded by a Lord’s Supper. The entire 



STREET IN LOS ANGELES 


congregation attend this meal, which is served at one 
long table in the meeting house. During the supper 
—a substantial one—the elder or minister reads aloud 
to his flock. Then tubs are brought in, men and 
women bare their legs, and each washes the feet of his 
or her neighbor and dries them, in imitation of Christ’s 
performing this service for the Apostles. 





THE GREAT SOUTHWEST 


123 


There are other interesting rites observed by the 
Dunkers. The women, for example, do not wear hats, 
only the bonnets described. Buttons, too, are ta¬ 
booed, only hooks and eyes being in use. 

Meantime, however, we are passing a point of interest 
we cannot afford to overlook, the famous San Gabriel 
Mission. This mission, appearing yellow and ancient 
among the trees, is one of the few still in actual use. 
We have just become interested in its history, which 
dates to the year 1771, when the porter calls “Los 
Angeles,” and the first great half of our Journey is done. 


Great American Industries 


By 

W. F. Rocheleau 



Greatamerican 

INDUSTRIES 


TRANSPORTATION^ 


In Four Volumes 
For Grades 5-8 


This series contains most valuable matter for use in the 
study of industry and commerce which is receiving so much 
attention in our schools today. Only those topics are included 
that are of general interest on account of their relation to our 
everyday life and the development of the natioh. 

The books have been cited for reference by authors of 
“Lessons in Community and National Life,” now being pub¬ 
lished and circulated by the U. S. Bureau of Education. 
MINERALS. Illustrated. 212 pages. Cloth. 75 cents. 

Treats Coal, Petroleum, Natural Gas, Iron, Marble, 
Granite, Slate, Gold, Silver, Copper, and Zinc. 

PRODUCTS OF THE SOIL. Illustrated. 194 pages. Cloth. 
75 cents. 

Lumber, Sugar, Cotton, Indian Corn, Wheat, Fruits. 
MANUFACTURES. Illustrated. 222 pages. Cloth. 75 cents. 

The manufacture of Motors, Giass, Shoes, Pins* Needles, 
Pencils, Pens, Paper, and Newspapers. 

TRANSPORTATION. Illustrated. 275 pages. 75 cents. 

Primitive methods of Travel and Transportation, Roads, 
Carriages, Waterways, Steam, Electric, and Mountain Rail¬ 
roads, Express, Carrying the Mails, Parcel Post, and Navigat¬ 
ing the Air. 

FARM ANIMALS AND FARM CROPS. By W. L. Nida. 
238 pages. Profusely illustrated. 75 cents. Grades five 
to eight. 

Horses, Cattle, Sheep, Swine, Poultry, Bees, Birds, Soils, 
Farm Crops, Country Roads, Farm Sanitation, Farmers’ 
College, Boys’ and Girls’ Clubs. 

A. FLANAGAN COMPANY—CHICAGO 













Popular Folk Games 
£iuci Dances Bymarikuef hofer 


For Playgrounds Vacation School* and Schoolroom Use 



HIS book contains forty-two of the Popular Folk Games 
and Dances of the different nations. They have been 
gathered from many interesting and original sources, 
and are intended to supplant the games which are often 
played by children as a result of lack of interest or help 
from the teacher, or for want of better material. They 
are, too, of great educational value in connection with 
the Study of Folk Lore, Traditions, and Customs of the Past 
and in forming a better opinion of the national characteristics and traits 
of the vast numbers of foreigners who make up our own population. In 
the beautiful Winding Games, we get a glimpse of a Pagan past, as well 
as the Middle Ages. The Knight and Bridge Games present episodes 
of Feudalism and the days of Chivalry. In the Industrial Games we 
touch the Guild life of Europe. In the picturesque National Dance 
we can meet half way the little stranger within.our gates, not only 
with the latest gymnastic device, but an appreciation of what must 
stand to him for centuries of national worth. 

Children of all ages will delight in performing the games as they are 
played in other lands. Music and full instructions. 

48 large pages. Price, 75 cents. 


Children’s Old and New 
Singing Games By mari ruef hofeb 


CHARMING collection of old and new singing games 
for school yards, kindergartens, and primary grades. 
There are forty singing games, all of which can be used in 
vacation schools, play-ground work, the school, and the 
home. Each game has a distinct reason for being. 
Besides the elements of interest supplied in repetition, 
rhyme, gesture, choosing, counting, etc., the singing 
game provides the dramatic situation so dear to the child heart. 

Also the aesthetic elements of song and rhythm have become valu¬ 
able in the making for the control and courtesy so much needed in the 
free play of childhood. The plays and games embrace a wide variety. 
We give names of a few only: Marching Game, Imitation and Gesture, 
Chasing, Catching, Imitation, Choosing, Representing, Competition, 
Counting, Winding, Color, Courtesy, Festival March, Hunting and 
Catching, etc., etc. 

Forty-four large pages Illustrated. Price, 50 cents. 

Our large Educational Book Catalogue is yours for the asking 



A. FLANAGAN COMPANY 


CHICAGO 































The Circus Cotton-Tails 


By 

LAURA ROUNTREE SMITH 
Illustrated by Fred Stearns 


* *TDLEASE tell us a laughing story,” pleaded a group of 
tenement children at the Settlement story hour. 

All children laugh when they read “The Circus Cotton-Tails” 
and how the merry little bunnies diligently practice their 
circus tricks while mischievous Bushy-Tail plays his tricks— 
whirling them off the merry-go-round, and stealing Susan 
Cotton-Tail’s cookies. How the cookies become alive and 
punish Bushy-Tail satisfies the little folk’s sense of justice. 
And they delight in the description of the big circus parade, 
and in the colored frontispiece and end sheets, to say nothing 
of the many fascinating black and white illustrations. 


128 pages. Cloth. 60 cents 


A. FLANAGAN COMPANY 

CHICAGO 
























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